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‘Zionist Pig!’ Antisemitic Discrimination at American University Alleged in New Civil Rights Complaint
Illustrative: Thousands of anti-Israel demonstrators from the Midwest gather in support of Palestinians and hold a rally and march through the Loop in Chicago on Oct. 21, 2023. Photo: Alexandra Buxbaum/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
Shocking allegations of antisemitic assault, discrimination, and harassment at American University in Washington DC were unveiled on Wednesday in a new complaint filed with the US Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights by the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and Jewish on Campus.
According to the complaint, pro-Hamas supporters spat on a Jewish Israeli student, someone graffitied swastikas in dorms for first-year students, and four Jewish students were charged with student conduct violations for recording video footage of pro-Hamas agitators tearing down missing persons posters of Israelis who were taken hostage by the Palestinian terrorist group on Oct. 7.
Shared with The Algemeiner on Wednesday, the complaint alleges egregious violations of Title VI of the US Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination in programs and activities that receive federal funding. The document begins with a summary of incidents experienced by Ben Enzer, a music and computer science major who, in addition to managing a rigorous course load, works two jobs as a teacher’s assistant and piano tutor to put himself through school. He is a Jewish Israeli American.
Enzer lost family and friends during Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel and has since then participated in events held to commemorate their lives. After leaving one such event held on campus, pro-Hamas protesters who saw him wearing an Israeli flag shouted “Zionist pig” at him. Two others riding on scooters with their faces concealed by keffiyehs — traditional headscarves worn in the Middle East that have become symbols of solidarity with the Palestinians against Israel — and N95 masks spat on him.
According to the complaint, although Enzer reported the incident to campus authorities and filed an additional complaint with the school’s Title IX office, which handles all reports of alleged discrimination, the university never responded to him, forcing him, at the advice of his mother, to avoid further harm by concealing his Star of David. Despite doing so, the spitting incidents continued, happening four more times. He was also called a “Zionist killer.”
Enzer allegedly had no recourse until the occurrence of an incident that was reported by The Eagle, American University’s campus newspaper, in November. He and other musicians had organized a recital, scheduled to take place on Dec. 10, and had posted around campus advertisements promoting the event. Someone later vandalized the advertisements, writing “Death to the Zionists Hitler was right” and drawing a swastika on them. American University refused to commence an investigation of the vandalisms, the Brandeis Center alleges, and two FBI officers dressed as civilians attended the recital to protect Enzer and his guests from violence.
“That the FBI needed to be called in demonstrates the level of physical threat to which [Enzer] was subjected. The situation on campus for Jews like [him] has deteriorated to such a degree because AU has long been derelict in its duty of care and protection of Jewish students on campus,” the complaint says.
“The university’s response to the incidents targeting [Enzer] has been wholly inadequate. It took the administration five days to contact [Enzer] after the vandalism incident, and even then, only one dean emailed him, nearly a week after the event, to inquire about his well being,” the document continues. “This was only after [Enzer] notified his professors that the administration had not offered him any support. AU’s failure to investigate the spitting incident [he] reported left the student feeling abandoned by the university and demonstrated the university’s lack of care and concern.”
The Algemeiner received permission to use Enzer’s name, which is redacted from the complaint where he’s described anonymously.
American University has ignored other antisemitic incidents on campus, according to the allegations. After Oct. 7, swastikas were graffitied three times in the first-year dormitory Letts Hall, as well as in a bathroom and on the doors of the residences of two Jewish students. A fourth vandalism was aborted when the student being targeted opened their door, causing the perpetrator to flee. One student whose door was vandalized was contacted by a person assumed to be involved in the incident in a text message that read, “I know who you are, Jew.”
The Brandeis Center added that 2023 was the third year in a row that swastika graffiti appeared on campus. In 2021 and 2022 the Nazi symbol was graffitied in bathrooms during Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, two of the holiest holidays in the Jewish religion. The civil rights organization alleges that American University never launched a serious investigation of the incidents, essentially enabling the behavior.
One of the last examples of alleged civil rights violations cited in the complaint touches on an issue that has received ample media attention in the months following the atrocities of Oct. 7: tearing down missing persons posters of Israelis who were taken hostage by Hamas. At American University, tearing down posters of any kind constitutes a violation of the student code of conduct. However, the Brandies Center alleges, the school’s administration did nothing when pro-Hamas supporters tore down missing posters of Israelis. It did, however, file disciplinary charges against Jewish students who recorded them committing the act.
“By turning the situation on its head and treating the perpetrators as the victims, the university demonstrated a disregard for the facts, held its Jewish and Israeli students to a double standard, enforced its own code of conduct in a discriminatory fashion, and retaliated against Jewish students for attempting to engage in the legally protected activity of attempting to protect their civil rights,” the complaint says.
The Brandies Center went on to describe numerous other incidents of alleged discrimination and bullying in the classroom. It is asking the US Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights to conduct a thorough investigation of its claims and has, in the interim, asked American University to suspend disciplinary proceedings against the Jewish students who filmed the vandalisms of missing persons posters, review its processes for investigating antisemitism, and begin compensating Enzer for lost wages and emotional suffering he has endured as a result of the treatment to which he was allegedly subjected during the fall semester.
American University did not respond to a request for comment for this story and has not yet responded publicly to the allegations, which are among the most damaging lodged against a US university since Oct. 7.
“Jewish students deserve consistent support from their university administrators, not harassment for standing up against antisemitism,” Jewish on Campus founder and CEO Julia Jassey said in a statement on Wednesday. “We urge a swift investigation and a campus climate where no student has to endure such harassment.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post ‘Zionist Pig!’ Antisemitic Discrimination at American University Alleged in New Civil Rights Complaint first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Israel Strikes Houthi Targets in Yemen
Smoke rises after Israeli strikes near Sanaa airport, in Sanaa, Yemen, Dec. 26, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Khaled Abdullah
Israel struck multiple targets linked to the Iran-aligned Houthi terrorist group in Yemen on Thursday, including Sanaa International Airport, and Houthi media said three people were killed.
The head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said he was about to board a plane at the airport when it came under attack. A crew member on the plane was injured, he said in a statement.
The Israeli military said that in addition to striking the airport, it also hit military infrastructure at the ports of Hodeidah, Salif, and Ras Kanatib on Yemen’s west coast. It also attacked the country’s Hezyaz and Ras Kanatib power stations.
Houthi-run Al Masirah TV said two people were killed in the strikes on the airport and one person was killed in the port hits, while 11 others were wounded in the attacks.
There was no comment from the Houthis, who have repeatedly fired drones and missiles towards Israel in what they describe as acts of solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said following the attacks that Israel will continue its mission until it is complete: “We are determined to sever this terror arm of Iran’s axis.”
The prime minister has been strengthened at home by the Israeli military’s campaign against Iran-backed Hezbollah forces in southern Lebanon and by its destruction of most of the Syrian army’s strategic weapons.
The Israeli attacks on the airport, Hodeidah and on one power station, were also reported by Al Masirah TV.
Tedros said he had been in Yemen to negotiate the release of detained UN staff detainees and to assess the humanitarian situation in Yemen.
“As we were about to board our flight from Sanaa … the airport came under aerial bombardment. One of our plane’s crew members was injured,” he said in a statement.
“The air traffic control tower, the departure lounge — just a few meters from where we were — and the runway were damaged,” he said, adding that he and his colleagues were safe.
There was no immediate comment from Israel on the incident.
More than a year of Houthi attacks have disrupted international shipping routes, forcing firms to re-route to longer and more expensive journeys that have in turn stoked fears over global inflation.
The UN Security Council is due to meet on Monday over Houthi attacks against Israel, Israel‘s UN Ambassador Danny Danon said on Wednesday.
On Saturday, Israel‘s military failed to intercept a missile from Yemen that fell in the Tel Aviv-Jaffa area, injuring 14 people.
The post Israel Strikes Houthi Targets in Yemen first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Controversial Islamic Group CAIR Chides US Ambassador to Israel Jack Lew for Denying Report of ‘Famine’ in Gaza
US Ambassador to Israel Jack Lew. Photo: Alchetron.
The Council on American–Islamic Relations (CAIR) has condemned US Ambassador to Israel Jack Lew for casting doubt on a new report claiming that famine has gripped northern Gaza.
The controversial Muslim advocacy group on Wednesday slammed Lew for his “callous dismissal” of the recent Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) report accusing Israel of inflicting famine on the Gaza Strip. The organization subsequently asserted that Israel had perpetrated an ethnic cleansing campaign in northern Gaza.
“Ambassador Lew’s callous dismissal of this shocking report by a US-backed agency exposing Israel’s campaign of forced starvation in Gaza reminds one of the old joke about a man who murdered his parents and then asked for mercy because he is now an ‘orphan,’” CAIR said in a statement.
“To reject a report on starvation in northern Gaza by appearing to boast about the fact that it has been successfully ethnically cleansed of its native population is just the latest example of Biden administration officials supporting, enabling, and excusing Israel’s clear and open campaign of genocide in Gaza,” the Washington, DC-based group continued.
On Monday, FEWS Net, a US-created provider of warning and analysis on food insecurity, released a report detailing that a famine had allegedly taken hold of northern Gaza. The report argued that 65,000-75,000 individuals remain stranded in the area without sufficient access to food.
“Israel’s near-total blockade of humanitarian and commercial food supplies to besieged areas of North Gaza Governorate” has resulted in mass starvation among scores of innocent civilians in the beleaguered enclave, the report stated.
Lew subsequently issued a statement denying the veracity of the FEWS Net report, slamming the organization for peddling “inaccurate” information and “causing confusion.”
“The report issued today on Gaza by FEWS NET relies on data that is outdated and inaccurate. We have worked closely with the Government of Israel and the UN to provide greater access to the North Governorate, and it is now apparent that the civilian population in that part of Gaza is in the range of 7,000-15,000, not 65,000-75,000 which is the basis of this report,” Lew wrote.
“At a time when inaccurate information is causing confusion and accusations, it is irresponsible to issue a report like this. We work day and night with the UN and our Israeli partners to meet humanitarian needs — which are great — and relying on inaccurate data is irresponsible,” Lew continued.
Following Lew’s repudiation, FEWS NET quietly removed the report on Wednesday, sparking outrage among supporters of the pro-Palestinian cause.
“We ask FEWS NET not to submit to the bullying of genocide supporters and to again make its report available to the public,” CAIR said in its statement.
In the year following the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s invasion of and massacre across southern Israel last Oct. 7, Israel has been repeatedly accused of inflicting famine in Hamas-ruled Gaza. Despite the allegations, there is scant evidence of mass starvation across the war-torn enclave.
This is not the first time that FEWS Net has attempted to accuse Israel of inflicting famine in Gaza. In June, the United Nations Famine Review Committee (FRC), a panel of experts in international food security and nutrition, rejected claims by FEWS Net that a famine had taken hold of northern Gaza. In rejecting the allegations, the FRC cited an “uncertainty and lack of convergence of the supporting evidence employed in the analysis.”
Meanwhile, CAIR has been embroiled in controversy since the onset of the Gaza war last October.
CAIR has been embroiled in controversy since the Oct. 7 atrocities. The head of CAIR, for example, said he was “happy” to witness Hamas’s rampage across southern Israel.
“The people of Gaza only decided to break the siege — the walls of the concentration camp — on Oct. 7,” CAIR co-founder and executive director Nihad Awad said in a speech during the American Muslims for Palestine convention in Chicago in November. “And yes, I was happy to see people breaking the siege and throwing down the shackles of their own land, and walk free into their land, which they were not allowed to walk in.”
CAIR has long been a controversial organization. In the 2000s, it was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing case. Politico noted in 2010 that “US District Court Judge Jorge Solis found that the government presented ‘ample evidence to establish the association’” of CAIR with Hamas.
According to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), “some of CAIR’s current leadership had early connections with organizations that are or were affiliated with Hamas.” CAIR has disputed the accuracy of the ADL’s claim and asserted that it “unequivocally condemn[s] all acts of terrorism, whether carried out by al-Qa’ida, the Real IRA, FARC, Hamas, ETA, or any other group designated by the US Department of State as a ‘Foreign Terrorist Organization.’”
The post Controversial Islamic Group CAIR Chides US Ambassador to Israel Jack Lew for Denying Report of ‘Famine’ in Gaza first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Jewish Civil Rights Group Representing Amsterdam Pogrom Victims Slams Dutch Court for ‘Light Sentences’
Israeli Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters are guarded by police after violence targeting Israeli football fans broke out in Amsterdam overnight, in Amsterdam, Netherlands, November 8, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Ami Shooman/Israel Hayom
The international Jewish civil rights organization legally representing more than 50 victims of the attack on Israeli soccer fans that took place in Amsterdam last month has joined many voices in lambasting a Dutch court for what they described as a mild punishment for the attackers.
“These sentences are an insult to the victims and a stain on the Dutch legal system,” The Lawfare Project’s founder and executive director Brooke Goldstein said in a statement on Wednesday. “Allowing individuals who coordinated and celebrated acts of violence to walk away with minimal consequences diminishes the rule of law and undermines trust in the judicial process. If this is the response to such blatant antisemitism, what hope is there for deterring future offenders or safeguarding the Jewish community.”
On Tuesday, a district court in Amsterdam sentenced five men for their participation in the violent attacks in the Dutch city against fans of the Israeli soccer team Maccabi Tel Aviv. The premeditated and coordinated violence took place on the night of Nov. 7 and into the early hours of Nov 8, before and after Maccabi Tel Aviv competed against the Dutch soccer team Ajax in a UEFA Europa League match. The five suspects were sentenced to up to 100 hours of community service and up to six months in prison.
The attackers were found guilty of public violence, which included kicking an individual lying on the ground, and inciting the violence by calling on members of a WhatsApp group chat to gather and attack Maccabi Tel Aviv fans. One man sentenced on Tuesday who had a “leading role” in the violence, according to prosecutors, was given the longest sentence — six months in prison.
“As someone who witnessed these trials firsthand, I am deeply disheartened by the leniency of these sentences,” added Ziporah Reich, director of litigation at The Lawfare Project. “The violent, coordinated attacks against Jews in Amsterdam are among the worst antisemitic incidents in Europe. These light sentences fail to reflect the gravity of these crimes and do little to deliver justice to the victims who are left traumatized and unheard. Even more troubling, they set a dangerous precedent, signaling to future offenders that such horrific acts of violence will not be met with serious consequences.”
The Lawfare Project said on Wednesday that it is representing over 50 victims of the Amsterdam attacks. It has also secured for their clients a local counsel — Peter Plasman, who is a partner at the Amsterdam-based law firm Kötter L’Homme Plasman — to represent them in the Netherlands. The Lawfare Project aims to protect the civil and human rights of Jewish people around the world through legal action.
Others who have criticized the Dutch court for its sentencing of the five men on Tuesday included Arsen Ostrovsky, a leading human rights attorney and CEO of The International Legal Forum; Tal-Or Cohen, the founder and CEO of CyberWell; and The Center for Information and Documentation on Israel.
The post Jewish Civil Rights Group Representing Amsterdam Pogrom Victims Slams Dutch Court for ‘Light Sentences’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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