Posted on 11/26/21
| News Source: Arutz-7
Five Jewish students are suing the government of the state of Victoria in Australia alleging they faced years of anti-Semitic harassment and bullying at a Melbourne high school.
According to Sky News Australia, the plaintiffs claim that as students of Brighton Secondary College they had to endure a “prison culture” on school property, including being held at knife point, spat at, pushed down stairs and punched while the school did little to nothing to stop the behavior.
The human rights case is being heard by a federal court and involves the potential violation of the Australian Racial Discrimination Act and negligence. They are also suing the school’s former principal and two teachers.
The five Jewish students allege that between 2013 and 2020 they were “subjected to normalized assaults and batterie, with constant anxiety and fear of attack, dreading school and having a sense they were not allowed to be openly Jewish (without unbearable treatment),” court records show.
Incidents mentioned by the plaintiffs include being told to “burn in an oven,” and being called a “dirty Jew” and “Jew boy,” as well as being subjected to students saying “Heil Hitler.”
The classmate of one Jewish student, the grandson of Holocaust survivors, allegedly picked up dirt and told him, “I’ve found your grandparents.”