UC Berkeley sued for allegedly discriminating against Israeli for teaching position

(The Center Square) — University of California, Berkeley is facing a lawsuit claiming it denied Dr. Yael Nativ a teaching role for being Israeli.

The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and Olivier & Schreiber filed a lawsuit against UC Berkeley for denying Nativ a job application due to her national origin.

“For a university to deny the invitation of a respected professor simply because of her national origin is not only distasteful, it’s illegal,” said Kenneth L. Marcus, chairman and CEO of the Brandeis Center and a graduate of UC Berkeley School of Law.

“And if the campus administration doesn’t hold themselves up to the same accountability standards that they hold their students, what is stopping their students from acting on their own discriminatory beliefs?" said Marcus, a former U.S. assistant secretary of education for the Bush and Trump administrations. "The vicious and illegal targeting of Israeli faculty and researchers is, unfortunately a disturbing new trend we are seeing nationwide that must stop.”

Back in 2022, Nativ, an Israeli dance researcher and sociologist, was a visiting professor at UC Berkeley. In reapplying for the 2024-2025 school year, according to the lawsuit, shortly after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, Nativ was expressly told by the chair of the department that she was rejected because of the potential backlash of hiring an Israeli professor.

“Things are very hot here [on campus] right now, and many of our grad students are angry. I would be putting the dept and you in a terrible position if you taught here,” said SanSan Kwan, the department chair of theater, dance and performance studies at UC Berkeley, in a WhatsApp message.

UC Berkeley’s Office for the Prevention of Harassment and Discrimination investigated the incident. In September 2024, the office concluded that Nativ “was the victim of national origin discrimination in violation of Berkeley’s Nondiscrimination Policy,” according to the lawsuit.

The policy states, “The University prohibits discrimination against any person … seeking employment.”

Yet Berkeley has failed to remedy its discrimination, despite Nativ’s many outreach efforts to the school, the lawsuit claims.

The Center Square reached out to UC Berkeley for a comment, but has yet to receive a response.

The lawsuit reflects ongoing tensions at universities nationwide, where some institutions face criticism for their handling of discrimination claims involving Jewish and Israeli students on campus.

In November 2023, UC Berkeley was hit with another lawsuit from the Brandeis Center for the “unchecked spread of anti-semitism” on Berkeley’s campus.

“The anti-Semitism Berkeley’s Jewish students find themselves embroiled in today did not start on Oct. 7,” Marcus said.

“It is a direct result of Berkeley’s leadership repeatedly turning a blind eye to unfettered Jew-hatred. The school is quick to address other types of hatred, but why not anti-Semitism?" Marcus said. "Berkeley, once a beacon of free speech, civil rights and equal treatment of persons regardless of race, religion, ethnicity, national origin, gender, and sexual preference, is heading down a very different and dangerous path from the one I proudly attended as a Jewish law student.”