The state of California, its Department of Education and officials were sued Thursday by two Jewish advocacy groups that alleged the state allowed antisemitic harassment of Jewish and Israeli students to go unchecked on campuses.<\/p>\n
The suit by Louis D. Brandeis Center<\/a> for Human Rights and StandWithUs<\/a> \u2014 nonprofits focused on Jewish civil rights \u2014 was filed on behalf of at least 12 Jewish parents and students who say they have faced \u201cpervasive anti-Semitism in their California public schools,\u201d court documents said. <\/p>\n The suit also names the California State Board of Education and State Supt. of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond. <\/p>\n The lawsuit alleges the state has violated the California Constitution\u2019s equal protection and free exercise clauses, which prohibit discrimination by a state-governed entity against certain religious groups. The suit seeks a court order that would require California to monitor on-campus antisemitism, eliminate antisemitic curricula and impose limits on funding for schools that fail to enforce nondiscrimination policies.<\/p>\n The California Department of Education and several of the school districts cited in the suit did not respond Thursday to requests for comment. <\/p>\n The suit <\/a> alleges eight K-12 school districts \u2014 including Los Angeles Unified, San Francisco Unified, Berkeley Unified, Fremont Unified and Oakland Unified \u2014 allowed antisemitism to \u201cfester\u201d on their campuses, actions the state did not intervene to stop. <\/p>\n The accusations include a Jewish student allegedly being forced to sit through a \u201ccelebration\u201d of Hamas\u2019 2023 attack against Israel at Daniel Pearl Magnet High School in Los Angeles and a Berkeley Unified teacher allegedly displaying imagery of a fist punching through the Star of David \u2014 a religious symbol present on Israel\u2019s national flag, the lawsuit said.<\/p>\n The lawsuit said some districts allowed \u201cunapproved curriculum\u201d featuring antisemitic tropes, including in Oakland, where an unauthorized \u201cteach-in\u201d protest included a children\u2019s book that allegedly read \u201cI is for Intifada,\u201d according to reports from the New York Times.<\/a> \u201cIntifada\u201d means \u201cuprising\u201d in Arabic.<\/p>\n \u201cJewish children and children perceived as Jewish are bullied and excluded by their peers and harassed by their teachers, who silence, mock, and even segregate them if they speak out,\u201d said Kenneth L. Marcus, chair of the Brandeis Center and the former U.S. assistant secretary of Education during the Bush and first Trump administrations.<\/p>\n Los Angeles high school parent Mike Rosenthal said in a testimonial published by the Brandeis Center that \u201cwe are joining this suit because our child felt unsafe expressing their Jewish identity in the public school after an adult teacher was permitted to display anti\u2011Jewish, anti\u2011Israel, and anti\u2011American materials in the classroom.\u201d <\/p>\n Catherine Lhamon, the executive director of the UC Berkeley Edley Center on Law and Democracy, said the Brandeis Center and StandWithUs lawsuit appears to express a vote of \u201cno confidence\u201d in California\u2019s recent legislative efforts to address antisemitism at schools. <\/p>\n