On the third anniversary of the October 7, 2023, Hamas terrorist attack on Israel, a Jewish former student at The New School filed a federal lawsuit against the university, accusing the school of failing to protect her from antisemitic harassment, physical assaults, vandalism, and exclusion from campus spaces.
The Lawfare Project, a legal organization dedicated to protecting the civil and human rights of Jewish people worldwide, together with co-counsel Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer LLP, filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on behalf of Sophie Shabot, a Jewish American and Israeli citizen who attended The New School’s Parsons School of Design.
The filing came on the third anniversary of the October 7 terrorist attack, in which more than 1,200 people were murdered and another 251 abducted.
The complaint describes a series of incidents beginning after the attack in which Shabot says she was subjected to antisemitic harassment on campus.
In December 2023, protesters blocked Shabot from entering the University Center while allowing non-Jewish students through, according to the lawsuit. The complaint says she was shoved out of the building, spat on, and screamed at through a bullhorn.
The lawsuit says another confrontation occurred in March 2024 after protesters vandalized and took over a space reserved for a Hillel event featuring an Israeli speaker and prevented Jewish students from entering.
The event was moved to a dean’s office without security, where Shabot and other Jewish students were trapped for roughly 20 minutes while protesters pounded on the door and demanded that they turn over the Israeli speaker, according to The Lawfare Project.
The organization says a New School professor then physically shoved the student guarding the door and that the university shut down the event over safety concerns rather than securing the gathering.
As the Jewish students left, protesters pursued Shabot for blocks while calling her a “baby killer,” “genocidal freak,” “Zio cunt,” and “Zio bitch,” according to the complaint. The Lawfare Project says no student was disciplined over the disruption.
The complaint describes another incident in April 2024 in which a crowd allegedly surrounded Shabot and her friends after hearing them speaking Hebrew, formed a tight circle around them, and drove them from the University Center as a security guard remained silent. Shabot’s desk and workspace were also vandalized, according to the filing.
In fall 2024, a protester threw a bottle toward Shabot’s head while she was sitting outside a campus building, missing her by inches, the lawsuit says.
Shabot repeatedly reported the harassment, confrontations, obstruction, and vandalism to professors, campus security, the Office of Student Conduct, senior administrators, and the Office of the President, often identifying those she said were responsible and supplying photographs and video, according to The Lawfare Project.
Following one incident, Shabot emailed more than 20 administrators, the organization says. Only two responded, with both suggesting that she seek therapy.
The complaint also accuses The New School of accommodating some of the protesters. According to The Lawfare Project, the university’s then-president gave participants in an unauthorized encampment $300 to purchase dinner, publicly praised them, and posed for a photograph that included the student accused of spitting on Shabot.
When protesters prevented Jewish students from entering the University Center, the university offered the Jewish students another entrance rather than removing those blocking them, the lawsuit says.
The Lawfare Project says the experience caused Shabot severe anxiety, panic attacks, and insomnia and impaired both her academic performance and her ability to use the studios and equipment required for her education.
“On the third anniversary of October 7, the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust, pro-Hamas rallies have been organized across the country, including at universities, to celebrate the massacre,” Lawfare Project Founder and Executive Director Brooke Goldstein said.
“The hatred unleashed on that day has fallen hardest on Jewish college students, including Sophie, and all too often they have been left to suffer in a hostile environment,” Goldstein continued. “This lawsuit is our response to the tidal wave of Jew-hatred on college campuses as well as The New School’s shameful abdication of its responsibility to protect its Jewish students.”
Goldstein said the organization would “continue to advocate for the rights of Jewish students and ensure that those protections are enforced.”
Ziporah Reich, director of litigation at The Lawfare Project and the attorney who filed the lawsuit, said the university had a legal obligation to provide Shabot with an educational environment free from discrimination and harassment.
“Instead, it looked the other way as she was subjected to appalling verbal and physical assault, exclusion, vandalism, and other forms of abuse simply because she is Jewish,” Reich said.
“Rather than protect Sophie, the administration accommodated those targeting her and left her to endure the consequences,” she continued. “The burden of discrimination should never be placed on the student being targeted. By filing this lawsuit, we intend to hold The New School accountable.”
Shabot said she brought the lawsuit because she wants the university held responsible and hopes it changes its treatment of Jewish students.
“I am bringing this lawsuit because what happened to me should not be allowed to happen without accountability,” Shabot said. “I hope that by speaking out, The New School will be forced to confront what went wrong, change the way it responds when Jewish students are targeted, and make sure that no other student has to endure what I did.”
The lawsuit asserts claims under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the New York State Human Rights Law, the New York Civil Rights Law, the New York City Human Rights Law, and the New York General Business Law. It also includes breach of contract and negligent infliction of emotional distress claims.
Shabot is seeking compensatory and punitive damages, statutory penalties, attorneys’ fees and costs, and other relief and has demanded a jury trial.
The Lawfare Project said the case follows other cases it says it has won or settled, resulting in changes on American college campuses.
The lawsuit comes as the Department of Education announced on X Wednesday:
“Recently released 2023–24 CRDC data show that Jewish students are the most frequently targeted for religion-based bullying. On the third anniversary of the tragedy of October 7, we encourage teachers, administrators, and state leaders to uphold civil rights protections and ensure every student has a safe learning environment.”
The New School has previously faced criticism over antisemitism on campus and its response to it.
Breitbart News reported in November 2016 that swastikas were found on four dorm-room doors at The New School’s Kerrey Hall in Manhattan. Student Sam Lichtenstein, who lived with three Jewish suitemates, said she broke down in tears after seeing one drawn in black marker on her door’s whiteboard. “It was just heartbreaking,” she said, adding, “We’re just overwhelmed and sad.” Lichtenstein said it was “crazy” for such an incident to happen “in such a progressive city, and a progressive university” while one of her roommates said the graffiti left her in “utter shock.”
In November 2017, Morton A. Klein, national president of the Zionist Organization of America, condemned The New School for hosting an event titled “Antisemitism and the Struggle for Justice” featuring Linda Sarsour and Rebecca Vilkomerson, then the head of Jewish Voice for Peace. In a Breitbart Jerusalem op-ed, Klein criticized both women over their anti-Israel activism, noting that Jewish Voice for Peace promoted anti-Israel boycotts and that Sarsour supported the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement.
He also cited Sarsour’s statement that “there is nothing creepier than Zionism,” her praise for convicted Palestinian terrorist Rasmea Odeh, associations with Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan and Imam Siraj Wahhaj, remarks invoking “jihad” against the Trump administration, past comments about Saddam Hussein, her contention that feminists could not also be Zionists, and several other statements and associations that Klein said made her an inappropriate choice for an antisemitism panel.
A separate Breitbart News report the following day detailed remarks from Susan Shapiro, a self-proclaimed liberal professor at The New School, who said she felt “betrayed” that the school’s Creative Publishing and Critical Journalism program was sponsoring the panel and described Sarsour as a “hatemonger.” Shapiro contrasted the treatment of anti-Israel rhetoric with how she believed similar comments about other groups would be received, writing, “Yet trash-talking Jewish Israelis is not only permitted in progressive circles, it’s rewarded.” She also wrote that “anti-Israel boycotts and bombast clearly mask vitriolic Jew-hatred” and pointed to what she viewed as a double standard in progressive circles.