How the University of Coimbra covered up antisemitism
by Bar Harel · The Washington TimesOPINION:
When a Jewish student becomes the target of a coordinated campaign of harassment at a university, the most alarming failure should not come from the school’s leadership.
Yet that is precisely what happened to me at the University of Coimbra, one of Europe’s oldest academic institutions.
Now, a newly finalized report by Portugal’s state ombudsman confirms it.
In a landmark ruling, the country’s constitutional watchdog found that the university did not merely mishandle complaints of antisemitism; it also violated administrative law.
It is, for Europe, a watershed moment that recalls the shocking congressional appearance by three presidents of elite U.S. universities in October 2024.
The report concludes that the school’s administration failed in its legal duty to investigate, ignored evidence of hate speech and committed “grave” violations of my fundamental rights. It also condemned the university’s attempt to portray my safety complaints as a psychological issue.
What happened at Coimbra should serve as a warning well beyond Portugal. The danger for Jewish students is not only the hostility they may encounter on campus but also the institutional instinct to suppress, deflect and ultimately deny it.
Until recently, I was a Ph.D. student in software engineering at Coimbra. In the aftermath of the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks and the war in the Gaza Strip, antisemitic agitation on campus intensified. By May 2024, after I began raising concerns, I became a target myself.
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The threats were explicit. “Your family deserves a second Holocaust,” I was told by angry individuals on campus.
I turned to the administration for help, but instead of investigating, it advised me to avoid parts of the faculty “for your own safety.”
Meanwhile, posters calling for violence (“Zionists should carry a certificate to prove they’re human,” “Beware of Zionists” and calls for intifada) remained unaddressed. When I questioned this, I was told the messages were “figures of speech.”
The university’s ombudsman, whose role is to safeguard student welfare, invoked “free speech” to justify inaction. To test the limits of that principle, I walked across campus with a small Israeli flag attached to my backpack. I was physically assaulted.
I reported the incident to the police. Internally, however, the response was very different. Emails later obtained show that the ombudsman complained to university leadership that my reports of antisemitism were causing “problems.”
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The pattern continued. After I spoke publicly at a university event in July 2024, the ombudsman falsely told the press that I was undergoing psychological treatment. The state ombudsman would later rule that solving security issues by sending those complaining to mental health specialists constituted a “grave” violation of my rights and an abuse of authority.
Under European data protection law, the disclosure of false medical information is itself a serious breach.
By that point, it had become clear that the university was not merely failing to act but also was actively working to discredit the complainant.
In early 2025, I filed a formal complaint with the state ombudsman. Around the same time, I published an independent report documenting the proliferation of pro-Hamas graffiti on campus over an 18-month period.
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The backlash escalated quickly. My personal information was circulated online. I was labeled a “Nazi.” Posters bearing my name appeared in the city, calling for my expulsion and, in some cases, violence.
On social media, dozens of commenters debated whether I should be beaten. My image was shared alongside calls for “death to the IDF.”
Local media amplified false claims about me. The situation deteriorated to the point that I received an unexpected call from an Israeli government official advising me not to leave my apartment and to prepare to leave the country immediately.
Soon afterward, both the Israeli and U.S. embassies intervened. The Israeli Embassy informed me it could not guarantee my safety and advised me to return home. The U.S. Embassy, after reviewing materials targeting me, wrote to the university that it understood why I felt unsafe.
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I left Portugal in September, abandoning my doctoral studies.
Even then, the university maintained its position. When I requested documentation of the school’s internal inquiry, the rector’s office acknowledged that no written record existed. The investigation, it said, consisted only of a “verbal consultation.”
In communications with police, the university claimed it had been “impossible to confirm” any of the incidents I reported.
There are photos of the posters.
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The state ombudsman’s findings dismantle that claim. The report concludes that the university adopted a “posture of fundamental passivity,” failing to investigate despite clear evidence. It also criticizes the rector’s subsequent legal threats against me as an attempt to “condition” my fundamental rights.
In an unprecedented step, the state has demanded that the University of Coimbra issue a formal gesture of reparation and adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism.
This case establishes something essential: Institutional passivity in the face of antisemitism is a violation of the law.
Universities often present themselves as guardians of truth and inquiry, but when reputational concerns outweigh their duty to protect students, those principles collapse. What happened at Coimbra is a classic case of attacking the victim rather than addressing the wrongdoing.
I lost my academic home and was forced to leave the continent, but at least the ombudsman’s ruling ensures that this case will not simply disappear. It sets a precedent that universities across Europe, and beyond, should heed.
• Bar Harel is a Tel Aviv-based software engineer and entrepreneur and a former Ph.D. student at Coimbra University.