More than a dozen Palestinian and Muslim students have filed a civil rights complaint with the U.S. Education Department, accusing Harvard University of failing to protect them from discrimination, harassment, and threats. The Muslim Legal Fund of America (MLFA) submitted the complaint, urging the federal government to investigate Harvard’s response to reported assaults, particularly targeting student activists advocating for Palestinian rights during the Israel-Hamas conflict.
The complaint details instances where students, some wearing keffiyehs (traditional Palestinian scarves), were attacked with objects or subjected to doxxing and intimidation. The harassment extended to on-campus jobs, affecting individuals who had not engaged in public activism. The rise in hate crimes related to protests over the Israel-Hamas war prompted investigations by the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights at various colleges, including Columbia, Cornell, Wellesley, and the University of Pennsylvania.
Since the beginning of the Israel-Hamas conflict, over 50 “shared ancestry” complaints have been filed with the Office for Civil Rights, involving allegations of discrimination based on a student’s perceived shared ancestry or ethnic characteristics. While it remains unclear how many of these complaints address antisemitism or anti-Muslim discrimination, the Education Department is actively investigating instances of harassment on campuses nationwide.
Catherine E. Lhamon, the department’s assistant secretary for civil rights, issued a ‘Dear Colleague’ letter in November, emphasizing that antisemitism, Islamophobia, and other hate-based discrimination have no place in the nation’s schools. Lhamon clarified that a civil rights investigation into an institution does not presuppose a violation of the law, but schools receiving federal funding must promptly address such discrimination.
The complaint against Harvard alleges inadequate support for students facing anti-Muslim harassment, with campus leaders reportedly warning protesters of potential risks to their future academic opportunities. Chelsea Glover, a senior civil litigation staff attorney involved in the complaint, expressed extreme disappointment in the details of the students’ ordeals, emphasizing that Harvard’s Palestinian, Muslim, and Arab students deserve equal protections on campus.
Harvard declined to comment on the specific complaint, but Jason Newton, a school spokesman, provided a document outlining resources in place to support students, including a Presidential Task Force on Combatting Islamophobia and Anti-Arab Bias.
The complaint sheds light on Harvard’s response or lack thereof to allegations of discrimination against Palestinian and Muslim students. The Education Department’s ongoing investigations underscore the importance of addressing and preventing harassment based on shared ancestry or ethnic characteristics on college campuses.
In December, then-president Claudine Gay testified alongside then-University of Pennsylvania President Elizabeth Magill at a Congressional hearing on antisemitism. Both administrators faced repercussions following equivocal responses to certain activists’ calls for genocide on campus. Magill resigned, and Gay stepped down amid accusations of plagiarism in her scholarship.
This week, the department settled an antisemitism complaint against a Delaware school district. The investigation revealed that a Jewish student had been harassed due to her identity, leading to the ordering of reimbursements for counseling costs and mandated anti-discrimination training for staff in the Red Clay Consolidated School District.