In the three months following the start of the Israel-Hamas war, anti-Semitic incidents in the U.S. increased by 360% compared to the same period one year prior. Anti-Muslim and anti-Palestinian incidents increased by 178%.

Some of these incidents occurred on K-12 and college campuses. In Georgia, a middle school teacher was fired for allegedly threatening physical harm to a 13-year-old girl. In Indiana, a woman was arrested for intentionally crashing her vehicle into a school because she thought it was an "Israel school." On Feb. 19, anti-Semitic incidents on U.S. college campuses since the start of the war passed 1,000.

Educational campuses have also made recent headlines for protests and administrators' handling of them. Pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian groups have sued their schools, claiming they haven't protected them from hate crimes or have violated their First Amendment rights by having the groups suspended.

All of these hate crimes and clashes raise many questions, including:

• What have K-12 and college leaders done right and what have they done wrong in how they respond to these incidents?
• How can they better mitigate and respond to them in the future?

To answer these questions, Campus Safety spoke with Jason Russell, former Secret Service agent and founder and president of Secure Environment Consultants.

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CAMPUS SAFETY SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS:

• Facebook: https://facebook.com/CampusSafetyMagazine
• X: https://x.com/CampusSafetyMag
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/CampusSafetyMag
• LinkedIn Group: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/1836305
• YouTube: @Campussafetymagazine