Hopkins, US education department resolve civil rights complaint from Israel-Palestine fallout

Racquel Bazos, The Baltimore Sun on Jan 8, 2025

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BALTIMORE — The Johns Hopkins University has agreed to provide additional staff and student training to resolve a complaint with the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights alleging harassment that might have created a hostile environment for shared ancestry harassment.

The office reviewed 99 complaints Hopkins received between October 2023 and May 2024 and found the school didn’t adequately consider whether the incidents were creating a hostile environment for students, the OCR said in a news release Tuesday. In a letter to university President Ronald J. Daniels, the office listed reports from Hopkins that described harassment toward both Jewish and Arab or Palestinian students.

The civil rights office also reviewed the university’s policies on discrimination and harassment, reporting incidents of discrimination and harassment, student conduct, student protests, postering, academic freedom and existing Title VI training. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act protects against discrimination on the basis of race, color or national origin in programs that receive federal funding.

The reports were filed in the wake of the Oct. 7 attack on Israel, when Hamas, designated a terror organization by the United States, Canada and the European Union, killed nearly 1,200 people and took roughly 250 hostages. Student protests erupted throughout the U.S., including at Hopkins and other Baltimore-area schools, in response to Israel’s offensive. Since the war began, over 45,800 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, according to local health authorities.

The original complaint filed with the civil rights office said a letter signed by some Hopkins faculty members and a similar letter from the graduate student workers’ union calling for a ceasefire in Palestine created a hostile environment for Jewish students. The OCR wrote that the university didn’t believe school policies were violated by the letter.

In the 99 reports made to Hopkins and reviewed by the education department, several concerned students reported their colleagues for pro-Palestinian political social media posts. Others reported pro-Palestinian posters were taken down or that photos of Israeli hostages were removed. One report complained that Palestinian flags were on campus at the start of Passover. The flags were subsequently removed.

In one report, a professor sent an email to students saying, “Those brutal Arabs will, God willing, pay a price like never before for simply butchering more than 1000 (!) Israelis including kids and elderly and CAPTURING INTO GAZA what looks like more than 200 civilians. Insane!!!!”

Another professor was placed on leave after making derogatory comments about Palestinians, including calling them “savage animals” on social media, the letter from OCR says.

The OCR also reviewed reports of antisemitic incidents, such as a swastika scratched into an elevator or when someone came to the pro-Palestinian encampment on the Hopkins campus and held a sign with a swastika on it. Hopkins Public Safety did not believe this person was associated with the pro-Palestinian demonstration group, as the protesters tried to grab the sign away from him, the letter says.

The OCR said that despite a “comprehensive” Title VI policy and proactive outreach in the wake of Oct. 7, Hopkins infrequently assessed whether these incidents were creating a hostile environment for either Jewish or Arab or Palestinian students, according to the release and letter to Daniels. Hopkins also used a faulty legal standard when evaluating whether an incident could create or contribute to a hostile environment, according to the letter.

A university spokesperson said, “Johns Hopkins University is deeply committed to fostering a safe, respectful, and inclusive environment for all members of our community. Discrimination of any kind, including anti-Semitism and anti-Arab bias, is not only at odds with university policy, but is also antithetical to our most fundamental values.”

As part of the agreement, Hopkins will be required to review its responses to all the shared ancestry discrimination or harassment complaints received by the university on or after Oct. 7, 2023, and through the end of that school year. Hopkins will send its responses to similar complaints received in the 2024-25 school year to the OCR.

Hopkins staff and employees who investigate these complaints now must receive annual training, the agreement states. Staff and students not involved with investigating such complaints will also receive training.

Lastly, Hopkins will assess the shared ancestry bias climate on campus and report its results to the civil rights office, per the agreement.

The Hopkins spokesperson said in an email Tuesday that the agreement “… builds upon and reinforces existing training and antidiscrimination efforts that are already underway. We will fully comply with the agreement.

“We have also been clear that acts of hate, threats, and discrimination violate university policy and the student code of conduct, and we remain committed to ensuring that all members of our community have the resources they need to feel safe and welcome on our campuses.”

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