Campus News

Lawsuit Alleges Pro-Palestinian Groups Behind Campus Protests Collaborate With Hamas

REUTERS/Caitlin Ochs

American and Israeli victims of the Hamas terrorist attacks against Israel filed a lawsuit on Wednesday against pro-Palestinian and Muslim advocacy groups over their alleged promotion and support for Hamas.

Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, killing roughly 1,200 people and kidnapping hundreds of others, which prompted sweeping pro-Palestinian protests across the country. A group of law firms representing the victims are suing American Muslims for Palestine (AMP) and National Students for Justice in Palestine (NSJP) over allegations that the groups have worked to propagandize and advance Hamas’ goals — including through recruitment efforts on embattled college campuses — thereby making them accomplices in the terrorist group’s atrocities.

The nine American and Israeli plaintiffs in the lawsuit are “survivors of Hamas’s October 7 terrorist attack, family members of those murdered by Hamas, civilians still under fire from Hamas’s ongoing terrorism, and persons displaced by Hamas’s ongoing terrorism.”

“Since Oct. 7, our country has witnessed a shocking rise in anti-Semitism, verbal and physical threats against Jews on our campuses and in our streets, vandalism, blockades, economic disruption, illegal encampments, and hostile takeovers of academic buildings—largely and concertedly directed by Hamas and its collaborators, American Muslims for Palestine and National Students for Justice in Palestine,” Scott Bornstein, senior vice president of Greenberg Traurig, one of the law firms representing the plaintiffs, said in a statement on Wednesday. “Until now, they have seemingly operated in a world without consequence.”

“With this lawsuit, we will hold Hamas’s collaborators accountable for their actions and show them and those in sympathy with them that no one is above, or beyond, the rule of law. As the son of one of the youngest survivors of Auschwitz, I am proud to be part of the team seeking vindication for our clients. We look forward to presenting the evidence to the judge and jury,” Bornstein said.

The NSJP is an extension of AMP, which uses it to branch its message and operations to hundreds of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) college chapters nationwide, according to the lawsuit. AMP has relied on NSJP to “to intimidate, convince, and recruit uninformed, misguided, and impressionable college students to serve as foot soldiers for Hamas on campus and beyond,” the lawsuit reads.

The lawsuit alleges that AMP and NSJP answered the terrorist group’s “call for mass mobilization” the day after the attack by spreading a “manifesto and plan of attack” in the form of an NSJP Toolkit, which included material identifying the groups as part of an uprising under the “unified command” of Hamas. The toolkit outlines that AMP and NSJP seek “liberation” — what the groups describe as a process requiring “confrontation by any means necessary,” including through “armed struggle,” according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit also claims that the NSJP toolkit appeared to include material created prior to Hamas’ attacks on Oct. 7.

“The NSJP Toolkit further provides graphics and advertisements for SJP Chapters and allies to use that includes images of paragliders, which references how Hamas infiltrated the Nova Festival [in Israel],” the lawsuit reads. “Neither Hamas, nor any other terrorist organization, had ever used paragliders to commit a terrorist attack until October 7 — just one day before NSJP provided the graphic.”

The toolkit endorses the Oct. 7 attacks and encourages Hamas to continue killing and kidnapping civilians, according to the lawsuit. It also claims AMP and NSJP “instigated a mass culture of fear, threats, violence, and overt hatred to intimidate politicians and institutions for Hamas’s substantial benefit.”

AMP and NSJP are involved in coordinating the widespread protests on universities across the U.S. in a bid to coerce governments and institutions “to bend to Hamas’s will,” according to the lawsuit. Several universities have been trying to quell chaos on campus in recent weeks as pro-Palestinian protesters took over academic buildings and set up encampments.

The lawsuit notes that there is a distinct difference between independent advocacy efforts and “knowingly serving as the propaganda and recruiting wing” of a U.S.-designated terrorist organization such as Hamas. AMP and NSJP fall into the latter category, according to the suit.

“It is an honor to lend our voice and resources to this fight in support of plaintiffs who have suffered greatly at the hands of terrorists,” Richard Rosenbaum, executive chairman of Greenberg Traurig, one of the law firms suing AMP and NSJP, said in a statement on Wednesday. “We have assembled a formidable team who will make certain that the strong evidence showing the defendants have violated the rule of law is presented in an American courtroom. Our team will work tirelessly to hold these organizations accountable for their actions carried out in concert with terrorists.”

AMP and NSJP did not immediately respond to a request for comment.