A Jewish student in San Francisco is suing her school principal, two of her former teachers, and her school district over what she called “pervasive and unrelenting” antisemitic bullying and discrimination over the past two years, according to a new report.
Eden Horwitz, a high school senior in the San Leandro Unified School District, and her mother, Montana Horwitz, allege in the lawsuit that the harassment the younger Horwitz received led to her suffering panic attacks and to her grades slipping, the San Francisco Chronicle reports.
It further alleges the teenager was exposed to taunting, antisemitic rallies, and anti-Jewish content in her coursework.
“After October 7, I felt very targeted by my peers, and the teachers either would agree or look the other way,” she told NBC Bay Area. “I just felt completely alone.”
The filing claims that the defendants not only ignored Horwitz’s complaints about antisemitic bullying, but that she was penalized for raising the issue.
Horwitz was a student at San Leandro High School’s Social Justice Academy, which focuses on issues like human and civil rights in its educational material.
The lawsuit says the academy became sympathetic to Palestinians in the wake of the October 7 attacks and the ensuing Israeli war in Gaza.
The teenager’s classmates allegedly demanded that she “answer for her entire people, wielded ‘Zionist’ as a slur, and held her personally responsible for ‘genocide’ — all because she is Jewish,” the lawsuit claims. “Peers with whom she had maintained long-standing relationships dating back to elementary school terminated their friendships with her.”
According to Horwitz, her teachers and administrators were “deliberately indifferent to the reported discrimination,” even after she complained that she was being harassed.
The lawsuit is asking for the school district to mandate training for all of its staff and students on antisemitism, shutter its Social Justice Academy until it stops teaching alleged antisemitic content, and issue a statement denouncing antisemitism.
Horwitz was expelled from the Social Justice Academy in 2025. According to the lawsuit, the academy kicked her out because she failed to adhere to its academic and attendance requirements. The lawsuit claims that her grades fell because of the harassment she was receiving.
Attorneys representing Horwitz and her mother said the lawsuit aims to force “systemic change” in the school system.
“This case exemplifies a disturbing trend: schools that champion social justice while turning a blind eye to antisemitism,” attorney Jerome Marcus of the Deborah Project said in a statement.
According to the SF Chronicle, there have been dozens of court challenges and administrative complaints targeting Bay Area schools, including those that involve antisemitism and Islamophobia, in recent years.
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