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Jewish Civil Rights Group Seeks to Overturn Dismissal of MIT Antisemitism Lawsuit
A pro-Hamas encampment at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Massachusetts, US, May 6, 2024. Photo: Brian Snyder via Reuters Connect
The StandWithUs Center for Legal Justice (SCLJ) has filed an appeal to overturn the dismissal of a lawsuit accusing the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) of responding to an explosion of antisemitic harassment and intimidation on campus with “deliberate indifference” to the welfare of Jewish students.
“MIT failed its Jewish and Israeli students and violated the law repeatedly,” SCLJ said in court documents, shared with The Algemeiner, filed with the US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit. “Properly considered, these allegations demonstrate MIT deliberately dragged its feet for months, only ever acting when the pressure and potential embarrassment due to its inaction boiled over, and even then, took only minimal action that fell far short of its legal obligations. These allegations also describe MIT’s selective enforcement of its rules to the detriment of its Jewish students.”
In August, US District Court Judge Richard Gaylore Stearns — who was appointed to the bench in 1993 by former US President Bill Clinton (D) and served as a political operative for and special assistant to Israel critic and former Democratic presidential nominee George McGovern — tossed the suit in a ruling which accused the Jewish plaintiffs of expecting MIT officials to be “clairvoyant” in anticipating a surge of antisemitism on campus following Hamass Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel last year.
Stearns also rejected SCLJ’s argument that pro-Hamas demonstrators at MIT intentionally violated the civil rights of Jewish students by, as is alleged, calling for a genocide of Jews in Israel and perpetrating numerous other acts of harassment and intimidation.
“Plaintiffs frame MIT’s response to the conflict largely as one of inaction. But the facts alleged tell a different story,” Stearns wrote in his decision. “Far from sitting on its hands, MIT took steps to contain the escalating on-campus protests that, in some instances, posed a genuine threat to the welfare of Jewish and Israeli students, who were at times personally victimized by the hostile demonstrators. MIT began by suspending student protesters from non-academic activities, permitting them only to attend academic classes, while suspending one of the most undisciplined of the pro-Palestine student groups.”
SCLJ argues that this decision was incorrect, having failed to consider key facts supported by both the public record and other documents that the plaintiffs reported.
“MIT’s response to this campaign of harassment was anemic. For instance, in response to the November 2, 2023 protest targeting individual Jewish professors and the office of MIT’s Israel internship program such that the staff and protesters felt trapped in their offices, MIT punished no students and sent no police,” the organization continued. “In response to the November 9, 2023 protest in Lobby 7, MIT warned students to protect themselves … rather than remove the students flagrantly violating MIT policy.”
Jewish students have consistently maintained that MIT’s response to antisemitism was delayed and paled in comparison to any action that it would have taken had the group subject to the discriminatory behavior been anything but Jewish.
“In the past five months, I’ve become traumatized,” Talia Khan, a student, told a US congressional committee in March, describing the situation at the university. “MIT has become overrun by terrorist supporters that directly threaten the lives of Jews on our campus. Members of the anti-Israel club on our campus have stated that violence against Jews who support Israel, including women and children, is acceptable. When this was reported to President Kornbluth and senior MIT administration, the issue was never dealt with. Then, administrators pleaded ignorance when we reminded them that no action had been taken, saying that they either forgot about it or missed the email.”
Khan went on to recount MIT’s efforts to suppress expressions of solidarity with Israel after the Hamas atrocities of Oct. 7. Such efforts included ordering Jewish students to remove Israeli flags from public display while allowing Palestinian flags to fly across campus. It is a “scandal” Khan explained, alienating Jewish students, staff, and faculty, many of whom resigned from an allegedly farcical committee formed on antisemitism. Staff were ignored, Khan said, after expressing fear that their lives were at risk, following an incident in which a mob of anti-Zionist activists amassed in front of the MIT Israel Internship office and attempted to infiltrate it, banging on its doors while “screaming” that Jews are committing genocide.
“No action was taken to discipline this behavior,” she continued. “We have DEI administrators, an inter-faith chaplain, and faculty who have openly supported Hamas as martyrs, harassed individual Jewish students online, and publicly supported antisemitic blood libel conspiracy theories. The MIT administration seems only to listen to those faculty and members of the MIT corporation who help them continue to gaslight Jewish students and faculty, telling us we’re being over dramatic and should just ‘go back to Israel if we don’t feel safe studying here.’”
MIT has continued to struggle with deterring antisemitism and extremism. This fall semester, a pro-Hamas group launched a smear campaign which accused a computer science professor of promoting “apartheid and genocide” by conducting research supported by grants from the Israeli Ministry of Defense.
The group then resorted a month later to creating “Wanted” posters featuring the professor’s face and plastering them across the campus, prompting a denunciation from MIT president Sally Kornbluth, who has herself been criticized for failing to respond sufficiently to the misconduct and vitriol of pro-Hamas students. Following her statement, a group calling itself the Jewish Alumni Alliance at MIT argued that Kornbluth’s alleged negligence fostered the environment she has now been forced to condemn.
In the past, Kornbluth has suspended anti-Zionist groups for breaking campus rules, but she has always maintained that she does not necessarily disagree with the content of their speech. For many observers, her official stance countenanced and even energized the radicalization of the student body, which perceived her comments as an implied approval of their ideology by not outwardly condemning it.
Recent developments point to a reckoning with these policy decisions. Last month, the university banned from campus a student who penned an article which argued that violence is a legitimate method of effecting political change and, moreover, advancing the pro-Palestinian movement.
Titled “On Pacifism,” the article — published in the MIT student publication Written Revolution and flanked by images of members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), an internationally designated terrorist group — argued that activists have failed to stop Israel’s war against Hamas and sunder the US-Israel relationship because of “our own decision to embrace nonviolence as our primary vehicle of change.”
The author, PhD candidate Prahlad Iyengar, continued, “One year into a horrific genocide, it is time for the movement to begin wreaking havoc, or else, as we’ve seen, business will indeed go on as usual …We have a duty to escalate for Palestine, and as I hope I’ve argued, the traditional pacifist strategies aren’t working because they are ‘designed into’ the system we fight against.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post Jewish Civil Rights Group Seeks to Overturn Dismissal of MIT Antisemitism Lawsuit first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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China, Russia Join Iran in Rejecting European Move to Restore Sanctions on Tehran
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian attends the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Summit 2025, in Tianjin, China, Sept. 1, 2025. Photo: Iran’s Presidential website/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
UN Security Council permanent members China and Russia backed Iran on Monday in rejecting a move by European countries to reimpose UN sanctions on Tehran loosened a decade ago under a nuclear agreement.
A letter signed by the Chinese, Russian, and Iranian foreign ministers said a move by Britain, France, and Germany to automatically restore the sanctions under a so-called “snapback mechanism” was “legally and procedurally flawed.”
China and Russia were signatories to Iran‘s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, along with the three European countries, known as the E3. US President Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the agreement in his first term in 2018.
The Europeans launched the “snapback mechanism” last week, accusing Iran of violating the deal, which had provided relief from international financial sanctions in return for curbs to Iran‘s nuclear program.
The letter published by Iran‘s Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi in a post on X on Monday said that the course taken by Britain, France, and Germany “abuses the authority and functions of the UN Security Council.”
Iran has long since broken through the limits on uranium production set under the 2015 deal, arguing that it is justified in doing so as a consequence of Washington having pulled out of the agreement. The deal expires in October this year, and the snapback mechanism would allow sanctions that were lifted under it to take effect again.
Iran and the E3 held talks aimed at a new nuclear agreement after Israel and the US bombed Iran‘s nuclear installations in mid-June. But the E3 deemed that talks in Geneva last week did not yield sufficient signals of readiness for a new deal from Iran.
“Our joint letter with my colleagues, the foreign ministers of China and Russia, signed in Tianjin, reflects the firm position that the European attempt to invoke snapback is legally baseless and politically destructive,” Iran‘s foreign minister said in his post on X.
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What Is Happening in the West?
A British bulldog toy and other souvenirs are pictured at a souvenir store, near Parliament Square, on ‘Brexit Day,’ in London, Jan. 31, 2020. Photo: Reuters / Simon Dawson.
In 1968, Enoch Powell — a British politician and writer — was attacked when he criticized immigration to Britain by large numbers of former members of the British Empire. At that time, I was convinced that he was off his rocker, largely because of the inflammatory language he used.
The Conservative Party expelled Powell and excoriated him for being a racist fanatic. At that time between 70 and 80% of the British population agreed with him. Anti-immigration in Powell’s day was directed at the black West Indians. But they in fact shared so much of the British cultural and religious values. Their only fight was racial prejudice — not imposing blasphemy laws or outlawing whatever they considered offensive speech.
In the 1970s, I was in the cabinet of Chief Rabbi Lord Jakobovits, who was responsible for Interfaith Affairs, and I must say I enjoyed very cordial relationships both with Christian, Hindu, and Muslim leaders. We hoped to work together, to support each other for a tolerant society.
Since then, Britain and Europe have changed beyond all recognition. In some ways, this has been very healthy. The old imperial white entitled middle and upper classes have seen the erosion of their grip on society. In its place, a much fairer and less prejudiced world emerged. But as with all cycles, there are reactions and have been major problems.
In Europe as in America, the cultural, academic, and human rights progressives have inexorably swung towards the left-wing neo-Marxist ideology that allows for any alliance, even with other groups with incompatible values, so long as it leads to power.
Like Stalin’s pact with Hitler, they have allied themselves with jihadi Islam and against Israel. The irrational theories of a universal, capitalist oppression lump everyone together regardless of history or nuance. Anyone perceived to be or have been suffering — regardless of the cause or the history or their wealth and status — is a victim. Everyone else is an oppressor.
This has resulted in a completely different ethos that is leading countries on a downward spiral of social and cultural conflict that is tearing apart societies and helping the rise of the only apparent alternative — fascism.
Welfare and health systems everywhere are in crisis. Public subsidies have made it almost unnecessary for so many people to find work. And yet, advanced countries desperately need new blood, to fill jobs — which will only increase as birth rates decline.
Unless the disparity is addressed, humanely, the result will be disastrous. Already there are no-go areas in the Western world, living according to different ethnic values that conflict with the dominant culture — and yet there is no serious effort to integrate them.
The UK Government’s own website explains, in straightforward terms, that anyone, including foreigners, can easily get subsidies — and can also help their families and friends.
We have ignored the explosive reality that is now changing Western civilization. Our lay and religious leadership has wanted to curry favor with governments for their own careers and status, and preached an apologetic gospel of naivete — a dream of sharing homes and co-operating and working together, that ignored an ideology of domination that came with many who have been preaching far-left and jihadi doctrines.
Liberal Jewish organizations on both sides of the Atlantic were so blinded by showing how liberal they were and only empowered enemies of Western values. Charity is important of course, but not at the expense of standing up for principles and the rights of everyone.
Meanwhile the press, the Internet, social media, and influencers have all but corrupted the minds of billions under our noses — and with our encouragement, they have all but erased the art of honest reporting, and reasonable, objective, and civilized discourse.
Too often, we have been told that Israel and the Jews are to blame, as if this disease, this culture war, were not endemic to our societies. We have allowed imported ideologies funded by rich states and enemies of freedom to spread, because we were overconfident and took our eyes off the ball.
Are we witnessing the death of Western culture and civilization? I pray not.
The author is a rabbi and writer, based in New York.
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Houthi Attacks on Israel Are a Real Threat — Why Won’t the World Acknowledge It?
A Houthi ballistic missile strike in the Palestinian village of Sa’ir. July 13, 2025. Credit: X/Twitter
On the evening of August 24, the BBC News website published a report by Paulin Kola headlined, “Israel hits Yemen’s Houthis after reports group used cluster bomb” which opens as follows:
Israel has carried out air strikes against Houthi targets in Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, in response to the group’s missile attack on Friday which Israel said carried cluster munitions.
Readers would of course be unlikely to know anything about “the group’s missile attack on Friday” — given that the BBC News website did not provide any coverage of that attack at the time, or in the 50 or so hours before the appearance of Kola’s article about Israel’s response to it.
Neither would BBC audiences be aware of the fact that earlier “on Friday,” the Houthis had also conducted a UAV attack — or that at least seven additional missile or UAV attacks had taken place since the beginning of August (1/8, 3/8, 5/8, 8/8, 12/8, 14/8, 17/8).
Readers wouldn’t know this, because — as we have noted in the past — the BBC generally ignores such attacks, unless Israel responds. And even then, the BBC fails to provide its audience with any sense of the scale of Houthi aggression against Israel, which according to the INSS has now reached over 400 attacks:
Perusal of the BBC News website’s “Houthis” page shows that prior to Kola’s August 24 report, the last three occasions on which audiences found any brief mentions of Houthi attacks on Israel were on June 10 , July 7, and July 10, 2025 — in the first two cases, also following Israeli retaliatory strikes.
Like many of his colleagues before him, Kola tells readers of this report that: [emphasis added]
Since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza in October 2023, the Houthis have regularly launched missiles at Israel and attacked commercial ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, saying they are acting in solidarity with the Palestinians.
The BBC’s serial use of the phrase “regularly launched missiles” of course fails to provide readers with any sense of the scale of those attacks, meaning that they are unable to put reporting about Israeli retaliatory strikes into the appropriate context.
On the topic of the attack on August 22 that used a missile containing cluster munitions, Kola tells readers that:
The Israeli military said the Houthi strike had been the first use of such bombs by the Iran-backed Houthis during the current conflict with Israel, local media and the AP reported.
The Israeli military is reportedly investigating why it was unable to intercept the missile carrying the munitions, which are banned by more than 100 countries. […]
After Friday’s attack, the Houthis released a video showing bombs dispersing mid-air.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) told media on Sunday that one such bomblet had landed on the yard of a home in the central Israeli town of Ginaton, causing light damage.
The IDF investigation centres on why the missile delivering the bombs was not intercepted before they had been dispersed, according to Israeli media.
That “light damage” can be seen in a Jerusalem Post report which also includes an account from the daughter of the home-owner.
“Fortunately, our mother heard the alarm and went into the emergency room. We talked while she was there, and she said there was a big boom. When she came out, she saw that the whole house was covered in glass,” Shira told Ynet. “It’s lucky that it fell close and not on the house. She said that the whole house shook, and as you can see, everything is shattered.”
The version of Kola’s report which is currently available online closes by telling readers that:
The [Houthi] rebels are backed by Iran, which Israel said also used cluster bombs during its 12-day confrontation with Israel in June. Iran did not respond at the time to this report.
Interestingly, Kola did not inform BBC audiences that, in addition to the IDF statements concerning Iranian cluster bomb attacks, Amnesty International (which the corporation often quotes and promotes) also put out a report citing three such attacks in June 2025.
Even more remarkable is the fact that the original version of that part of Kola’s report read as follows:
The [Houthi] rebels are supplied by Iran, which also used cluster bombs during its 12-day confrontation with Israel in June.
However, some 11-and-a-half hours later, that paragraph was amended to make it less accurate and informative.
Hadar Sela is the co-editor of CAMERA UK – an affiliate of the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA), where a version of this article first appeared.