Palestine Legal filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights demanding an investigation in the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC), after the university intentionally barred Palestinian students from a January 2023 informational session on study abroad in Israel.

We’re challenging GW's selective and discriminatory cancelation of trauma support services for Palestinian students after Israel’s violent repression of Palestinian protests in Jerusalem and another devastating war on Gaza in spring 2021.

Palestine Legal represented Bard College students Ben and Akiva, who were investigated after they protested a panel featuring a professor with a history of making bigoted remarks against Palestinians. Both students were cleared of any wrongdoing.

Despite repeated efforts to exclude Palestinian voices from campus conversations, students at Butler University in Indiana have persevered in asserting their right to organize for Palestine, including a successful campaign in October 2020 against student government resolutions that aimed to silence them and the reinstatement of an April 2021 event with Angela Davis that was canceled following complaints about her support for Palestinian rights.

City University of New York School of Law (CUNY Law) student Nerdeen Kiswani is a well-known activist for Palestinian freedom. As a vocal and visibly Muslim advocate for Palestinian liberation, Nerdeen is regularly targeted by Zionist groups who have smear campaigns and false accusations of antisemitism to vilify her. Since Nerdeen started CUNY Law in Fall 2019, anti-Palestinian students and groups, like StopAntisemitism and BDSReport, have targeted Nerdeen, often by using cyberbullying tactics.

In June 2020, Ahmad Daraldik made history as the first Palestinian elected as president of the Florida State University (FSU) student senate. Over the following year, a disturbing environment of anti-Palestinian racism at FSU denied Ahmad equal access to campus life on the basis of his national origin. In April 2021, Ahmad filed a complaint with the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights that the anti-Palestinian hostile environment at FSU violates Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

A right-wing lawyer is going to court to force UCLA to turn over a list of activists who presented at the 2018 National Students for Justice in Palestine conference. David Abrams is trying to harass these students and help those who falsely equate opposition to Israeli policies with support for terrorism.

In April 2019, an anonymous group of pro-Israel students sued the University of Massachusetts Amherst in an attempt to prevent a panel featuring Marc Lamont Hill, Linda Sarsour, Roger Waters, Dave Zirin, and moderator Vijay Prashad from taking place on campus.

In October 2018, just ahead of the annual National Students for Justice in Palestine (NSJP) conference, UCLA sent NSJP a letter claiming that a bear logo used by the group violated the school’s trademark. The university’s threat was sent to NSJP amid a barrage of efforts by pro-Israel actors to shut down the conference at UCLA.

Students Supporting Israel at Columbia University has filed several harassing complaints against professors and students for speech critical of Israeli policies. All complaints have been dismissed.

In March 2016, the Louis D. Brandeis Center, an Israel advocacy organization, sued the American Studies Association over its 2013 resolution to boycott Israeli academic institutions.

In April 2018, the City College of New York cancelled a Students for Justice in Palestine-organized book event for fear it would generate negative publicity.

San Francisco State University is at the heart of a multipronged legal effort by Israel advocacy organizations seeking to silence students and faculty who stand for Palestinian rights.

In September 2011, far-right Israel advocacy group StandWithUs initiated a lawsuit against Olympia Food Co-op board members after the board voted to boycott Israeli goods. 

In November 2017, a New York City book store was compelled to hide copies of a children’s alphabet book, P is for Palestine, behind the cash register, and ultimately release a statement denouncing boycotts for Palestinian rights after local Israel supporters and a prominent local synagogue complained about the book.

In spring 2016, two well-known leaders of City University of New York-Brooklyn College SJP were investigated, charged with student conduct violations and ultimately exonerated after they briefly protested during a faculty council meeting to voice concerns over tuition increases, faculty diversity, police surveillance and other topics.

In October 2013, the Department of Homeland Security arrested Rasmea Odeh, a pillar of the Palestinian community in Chicago, and charged her with ‘unlawful procurement of naturalization’ for omitting mention of her arrest and conviction by an Israeli military court on her citizenship application.