Published by the Jewish Insider on 11/5/2024. A federal lawsuit against Harvard University that alleges the school has ignored the harassment of Jewish students for more than a year is set to begin after a U.S. District Court judge on Tuesday rejected Harvard’s request for dismissal, but denied claims that the school directly discriminated against Jewish and Israeli students. Filed in May in federal court in Boston by the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and Jewish Americans for Fairness in Education, the lawsuit alleges that since the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks in Israel, students and faculty on campus have called for violence against Jews and celebrated Hamas’ terrorism daily as the university did nothing to stop harassment —- including a physical assault — of Jewish students. Five months earlier, the group filed a previous complaint against the university’s John F. Kennedy School of Government for violating Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The lawsuit, which was first reported by JI, states that Harvard allowed student protesters to occupy and vandalize buildings, and interrupt classes and exams. “Professors, too, have… spread antisemitic propaganda in their classes,” according to a Brandeis Center statement in May. “Jewish students are bullied and spat on, intimidated, and threatened, and subject to verbal and physical harassment.” In Tuesday’s decision, Judge Robert Stearns wrote that to prove deliberate indifference, plaintiffs must plead that the school “either did nothing or failed to take additional reasonable measures after it learned that its initial remedies were ineffective.” In a statement, a university spokesperson said, “Harvard has and will continue to take concrete steps to address the root causes of antisemitism on campus and protect our Jewish and Israeli students, ensuring they may pursue their education free from harassment and discrimination. We appreciate that the Court dismissed the claim that Harvard directly discriminated or retaliated against members of our community, and we understand that the court considers it too early to make determinations on other claims. Harvard is confident that once the facts in this case are made clear, it will be evident that Harvard has taken significant steps to strengthen and clarify our policies and procedures, as well as engage our community around civil dialogue to bridge divides.” Tuesday’s decision came just days after the House Committee on Education and the Workforce released a more than 100-page report on its year-long probe of antisemitism on U.S. college campuses, including Columbia and Northwestern University. On Harvard’s campus, according to the report, two days after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, Harvard administrators failed to explicitly condemn the Hamas attack and drew equivalences between the attack and Israel’s response in an Oct. 9 statement. The report also brought to light that no Harvard students have been suspended for antisemitic activity; in some cases, students who were initially suspended had their suspensions downgraded to probation. And the vast majority of students placed on probation for their involvement with an encampment at Harvard had their probation periods shortened. The lawsuit comes amid a separate case, filed in federal court by six Jewish Harvard students who allege the school has not protected them from “severe and pervasive” campus antisemitism. In August, Stearns ruled that case would also go to trial, despite throwing out a similar lawsuit filed by Jewish students at MIT alleging that the school didn’t do enough to curb antisemitism on campus just days earlier. At the time, Stearns wrote that the plaintiffs “plausibly establish that Harvard’s response failed Title VI’s commands.” “Harvard’s motion to dismiss was the biggest potential procedural obstacle to our case, and I’m delighted that we’ve cleared that obstacle and are headed toward discovery and trial,” Kenneth Marcus, founder and chairman of the Brandeis Center, and former U.S. assistant secretary of education in the Bush and Trump administrations, told Jewish Insider. The decision on Tuesday “provides further indication of the extent of the problems at Harvard and reasons why that institution needs to be held accountable,” Marcus said. “Harvard has to realize that with this lawsuit pending, they need to take much more seriously the problems that Jewish students are facing on campus.” Following the congressional report, it’s “all too clear that major universities aren’t responding effectively enough to antisemitism,” Marcus said. “That should be a message,” he continued, “not just to Harvard, but also to other institutions.” Jewish Insider’s senior congressional correspondent Marc Rod contributed reporting.