The Brandeis Brief: December 2023 This month, the U.S. Education Department announced it opened civil rights investigations at the University of Pennsylvania and Wellesley College in response to anti-Semitism complaints filed by the Brandeis Center and Jewish On Campus. Brandeis Center Chairman Kenneth L. Marcus testified three times before Congress about the recent rise in campus anti-Semitism. And responding to the eruption of anti-Semitism on campus after the October 7 terrorist attacks in Israel, the Brandeis Center, along with leading Jewish organizations and law firms launched a free legal protection helpline providing pro bono legal services to Jewish students, faculty and staff. Education Department will Investigate Anti-Semitism Complaints filed by the Brandeis Center against the University of Pennsylvania and Wellesley The Dept. of Education Office for Civil Rights (OCR) opened investigations into anti-Semitism at the University of Pennsylvania and Wellesley College. OCR announced the two investigations one week after the Brandeis Center filed Title VI complaints against both schools. The Brandeis Center and Jewish on Campus jointly filed the anti-Semitism complaint against Wellesley college, where the university’s residential staff excluded Jewish students from a residential hall by sending an email to students stating “there is no space for Zionists” in the Wellesley community. The University of Pennsylvania’s failure to adequately address repeated instances of anti-Semitism on its campus before October 7, has resulted in more anti-Semitism after the Hamas attacks and made the campus a magnet for anti-Semites in the local community. “These colleges and universities have failed to keep Jewish students safe and are in clear violation of well-established federal civil rights law,” stated Brandeis Center Chairman Kenneth L. Marcus. “We’re encouraged to see the investigations into UPenn and Wellesley move forward, and we thank Assistant Secretary Catherine Lhamon and her team at OCR for their prompt attention to this matter. “This might be a sign that OCR just gets it,” Marcus added. “They’re moving so quickly that it seems like they’re actually trying to send a message, whether to the Jewish community or to higher education, or to both. OCR seldom moves this quickly and to open this many cases as a batch really does send a signal.” “I want students to know that if they encounter any other anti-Semitic incidents or if they feel frightened that they should contact [the Brandeis Center], because we can always send in [updates] to the complaint,” LDB staff attorney and Penn alumna Deena Margolies told Penn’s student newspaper, The Daily Pennsylvanian. “Kenneth L. Marcus is absolutely right,” wrote ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt. “There’s been a lot of talk about rooting out anti-Semitism on campuses, and it’s time to hold these colleges accountable.” Kenneth L. Marcus Testifies before Congress About Rise in Campus anti-Semitism Brandeis Center Chairman Kenneth L. Marcus testified before Congress about surging campus anti-Semitism on three occasions in the last two weeks. On November 8, Chairman Marcus spoke before the House Judiciary Committee hearing “Free Speech on College Campuses,” which examined how schools should respond to hostile speech on campus. It also explored the rise in anti-Semitism, anti-Israel sentiment, and violence toward students supporting Israel. One day later, Chairman Marcus testified before a Senate roundtable discussion, examining the rising rates of anti-Semitic harassment and violence on college campuses, led by U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy, ranking member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee. The roundtable also reviewed the Biden administration’s legal responsibility to protect Jewish students under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 – a policy known as the “Marcus Doctrine.” And on November 14, Chairman Marcus testified before the House Committee on Education and the Workforce Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Development in a hearing titled “Confronting the Scourge of Antisemitism on Campus.” The hearing examined the increase of anti-Semitism on college campuses in the wake of the Hamas attack on Israel. “When the problem is exceptional and unprecedented, the solutions need to be unprecedented and exceptional,” Marcus told the latter committee, emphasizing the need for the Biden administration to be more proactive in opening new investigations before complaints are even filed. Sacramento Bee Cites Alyza D. Lewin’s Work about the Targeting of Jewish Identity on Campus In a recent op-ed about anti-Jewish hostility on campus, the Sacramento Bee cited President Alyza D. Lewin’s column in Sapir Magazine about the failures of college administrators to protect Jewish students: “Most university administrators do not appreciate that Judaism is an ethno-religion, a belief system inextricably connected to cultural heritage, traditions, history and land,” Lewin wrote. “The connection between Jews and the Land of Israel permeates the Jewish calendar, Jewish life-cycle events, Jewish law, Jewish prayer and Jewish history.” The author highlighted Lewin’s helpful analogy illustrating the double standards applied to Jewish students: Would campus administrators “permit student clubs to demand that Catholics disavow the Vatican or that Muslims shed their connection to Mecca in order to be accepted. Or would the administrators recognize that such a demand is discriminatory, biased and immoral?” Kenneth L. Marcus Criticizes OCR For its Tame Response to Campus Anti-Semitism Surge After a call with other Jewish American community organization leaders and top U.S. Dept. of Education officials, Brandeis Center Chairman Kenneth L. Marcus criticized the lack of urgency and action by officials to meet the unprecedented surge of campus anti-Semitism following the Hamas October 7 Massacre. “They did not give us a plan to deal with an unprecedented surge in anti-Semitic activity,” declared Chairman Marcus. Instead, Marcus said, the Education Department leaders on the call touted insufficient steps already taken by the Biden administration and expressed concern about the problem without offering many new approaches. “It’s notable when two such high officials of the Education Department are present,” Marcus continued. “But beyond that, I would say that the meeting was most notable for the absence of a significant plan for addressing this extraordinary problem.” Regarding a “Dear Colleague” letter OCR sent, reminding universities to address anti-Semitism, Marcus said: “They should get credit for sending a letter, but they could have sent something much stronger. I was also hoping that the administration would communicate publicly more of the concern that they are sharing privately.” The Brandeis Center and Leading Jewish Organizations Launch Free Legal Protection Helpline for Campus Anti-Semitism In response to the surge of anti-Semitic incidents on campus following the October 7 Hamas attacks, the Brandeis Center, ADL, Hillel International and Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP launched a helpline providing pro bono legal services for students and faculty experiencing anti-Semitism on campus. Students, family, faculty or staff members who experience anti-Semitic harassment, intimidation, discrimination, vandalism or violence can contact the helpline, which is staffed by a team of volunteer attorneys who will conduct in-depth interviews and information gathering, assess potential cases, and provide pro bono legal representation to victims who want to take legal action. Contact the helpline (CALL) by texting “CALLhelp” to the number 51555 or online at legal-protection.org. “The frightening incidents we’re seeing on campus today did not start on Oct. 7. They are a direct result of far too many universities failing in their legal responsibility to promptly, publicly and forcefully address the anti-Semitism that has been simmering on their campus for years,” stated Brandeis Center President Alyza D. Lewin. “This explosion of Jew-hatred was foreseeable and preventable. It’s high time for universities to enforce the law and protect their Jewish students.” LDB Sends Legal Warning to Harvard, Demanding Immediate Action In response to action by the Brandeis Center last March, Harvard University found that a professor at its Kennedy School discriminated against three Jewish Israeli graduate students in violation of its own policies and federal civil rights guidance under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Since then, Harvard has not only failed to address the anti-Semitism among its faculty, but its leaders even publicly touted the anti-Semitic professor recently as a civil rights hero. This prompted LDB to send a strongly-worded legal warning to Harvard’s general counsel, demanding the school take the prompt action required under law. “This failure, on top of other failures of leadership, have set the stage for the worsening climate that we have seen for Jewish Harvard students since [Oct. 7],” wrote the Brandeis Center, referring to numerous events of late, including the support more than 30 Harvard student groups recently expressed for Hamas, rallies attended by students and faculty celebrating Hamas’ barbaric acts, the posting of Hamas paratrooper images to intimidate Jewish students, and the university’s own equating of Hamas terrorists and the IDF. “Harvard’s failure to speak out against anti-Semitism masked as anti-Zionism has only emboldened the student groups who are now celebrating Hamas’ atrocities. The silence needs to end.” “It’s extraordinary that Harvard on the one hand is willing to acknowledge that clients faced inappropriate discrimination and different treatment and yet is not taking meaningful action to address it,” stated Brandeis Center Chairman and Harvard Kennedy School alum Kenneth L. Marcus. Kenneth L. Marcus Blitzes Airwaves to Defend Jewish Students and Prompt Govt. Action to Protect Them During the same period where Brandeis Center Chairman Kenneth L. Marcus testified before Congress on the surge of campus anti-Semitism, Marcus also sat for three national television interviews to hammer home the problem and elicit more effective action from the U.S. Dept. of Education – or if needed, Congress itself. Marcus spoke on Fox News November 11, telling host Mark Levin that the Dept. of Education has the power to initiate investigations of campus anti-Semitism on its own without waiting for complaints to be filed: “That is the whole purpose for why we have an agency called OCR. That’s the agency that I formerly ran. And its sole obligation is to make sure that federal funds are not used to support discriminatory behavior,” Marcus asserted. “It does this on a whole host of other issues. It needs to do it with anti-Semitism.” “The fact is that for Jewish Americans, the entire world has changed….They’re watching their classmates and in some cases their professors ‘exhilarated’ by mass slaughter of Jews,” Marcus told Elizabeth Vargas on the Newsnation network on November 14. “We have more [Title VI civil rights complaints] that we will be filing in the coming weeks. But the Dept. of Education shouldn’t just wait for our cases. [It] has the power to initiate its own investigations.” And on November 16, Marcus told Newsmax: “It’s a shame, because DEI (Diversity Equity and Inclusion) programs are intended to protect minorities, and…are in some cases making the situation worse….The fundamental ideology that we see too often in DEI programs is based on assumptions that people are either oppressors or oppressed – and not only is anti-Semitism not part of that story, but when Jews are mentioned, it’s too often based on stereotypes about Jewish power…and actually fueling the hate that is aimed at the Jewish people.” Surge in Campus anti-Semitism “Was Predictable,” Denise Katz-Prober Tells JewishLink Addressing the eruption of anti-Semitic threats and violence directed at Jewish students in the wake of the Hamas October 7 Massacre, Brandeis Center Director of Legal Initiatives Denise Katz-Prober told news organization JewishLink: “This certainly did not happen in a vacuum.” “The Brandeis Center has been warning for years that university administrators were not addressing the anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism on their campuses, and when you sweep it under the rug this is what happens,” stated Katz-Prober, who also revealed LDB has been deluged with inquiries from parents and faculty from K-12th grade through college since October 7. “Frankly this was predictable,” Katz-Prober said, adding that university leaders failed to recognize that Jewish students have a shared connection to Israel, and that anti-Israel rhetoric is anti-Semitic, leading to Jewish students feeling unsafe and unsupported on their campuses. “When Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and other groups are celebrating and even justifying Hamas’ atrocities when we know Hamas targeted innocent civilians, they are celebrating violence against Jews,” she noted. “And when university administrators do not forcefully condemn this, they are fostering a hostile atmosphere on campus for Israeli and Jewish students and contributing to a very real fear for their safety.” Kenneth L. Marcus Tells SHRM How Companies Can Aid Jewish Employees in this Moment Speaking to the Society for Human Resource Management, Brandeis Center Chairman Kenneth L. Marcus provided advice to HR professionals following the recent Hamas atrocities – helping them provide proactive support to Jewish employees who are grieving the tragedy in Israel and may experience anti-Jewish and anti-Israel hostility in the workplace. Companies must realize that many Jewish and Palestinian employees are undergoing an “extraordinarily difficult time” emotionally, stated Chairman Marcus. “Employers need to understand that such emotions are impossible to keep entirely separated from the workplace,” he noted. Marcus said Jewish employees need employee resource groups (ERGs) now more than ever before, “and I suspect that this is also true for other groups.” International Lawyer Cites Kenneth L. Marcus Article A new Times of Israel blog by international lawyer Olivia Flasch, about recent condemnations of Israel that sometimes ignore the facts, quotes Brandeis Center Chairman Kenneth L. Marcus’s article Accusation in Mirror: “Suddenly we have shifted from complaints [of] self-defense, from demanding [our] rights to convinc[ing] the public that we are not depriving others of their rights […] How have we suddenly turned from persecuted into persecutors, from the weak into the strong and tyrannical, from the attacked into the infamous attackers, and from the poor into the rich exploiters? How did these lies become widespread, without us gaining any ground or improving our situation one whit?” Brandeis Center Blogs Brandeis Center interns and staff have also responded to the onslaught of anti-Jewish hate in Israel and around the world with prolific activity on the Brandeis Center blog.Brandeis Center Policy Director Emma Enig recapped the congressional briefing she produced on the rise of American anti-Semitism following October 7. The event was LDB’s second-ever Capitol Hill briefing – and coming up quickly is its third on December 13.Brandeis Center intern Bryn Schneider contextualized a recent letter from U.S. Reps. Kevin Kiley and Burgess Owens to OCR, demanding more concrete and prompt action to combat campus anti-Semitism – and how it furthers goals and ideas that had been recommended in prior testimony by the Brandeis Center. And Brandeis Center intern Annabelle Enig authored two new pieces – one about the International Committee of the Red Cross’ refusal to take up the cause of liberating Israeli and international hostages held in Gaza, and another about LDB’s response to the Meta Oversight Board’s invitation for public comment on the issue of Holocaust denial on its platforms Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp.