An Israeli chemist who resigned from Stanford University is suing the school after he claims it was complicit in antisemitism that he faced at the school — including the alleged tampering with his lab results, Jewish Insider has learned. 

The Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and Los Angeles-based law firm Cohen Williams LLP filed a federal lawsuit on Thursday on behalf of Shay Laps, a Jewish Israeli postdoctoral researcher who was hired by Stanford in April 2024 after being recommended by a Nobel laureate. Laps’ research focused on synthetic and “smart” insulin, aiming to revolutionize diabetes treatment. 

According to the lawsuit, after arriving in professor Danny Chou’s Stanford lab, Laps was targeted by a lab staffer who knew that he was a Jewish scientist from Israel. At their first meeting, the suit alleges, the staffer told Laps, the only Israeli in the building, never to speak to her, and later excluded Laps from sitting with her and other staffers during lunch. Laps expressed that the staffer treated other colleagues kindly. 

The complaint also names Chou, an associate professor of pediatrics and the lab’s leader and mentor, as a defendant. 

The discrimination escalated when, according to Laps, the lab staffer tampered with his research, producing fraudulent results without his knowledge. Laps said that upon the discovery of the alleged sabotage of his experiments, Chou refused to address the issue — and eventually pressured Laps to leave the country by falsely claiming that Stanford’s Title IX Office had alerted Chou to a complaint and formal investigation against Laps and that his immigration status was on the line. Stanford’s Title IX Office later confirmed that there was no complaint or investigation against Laps, according to the suit. 

Stanford President Jonathan Levin and the School of Medicine Dean Lloyd Minor disregarded Laps’ attempts for help, the lawsuit alleges. Ultimately, Laps felt he had no choice but to resign.

Talia Nissimyan, a lawyer at Cohen Williams who is representing Laps, said that as Laps “suffered discrimination and retaliation based on his religion, national origin, and ethnicity, the university preferred not to look.”

“Instead, they attempted to bury Dr. Laps’ career, and when that didn’t work, to bully him into rescinding his complaints,” Nissimyan said in a statement. “Stanford succumbed to the rising tide of campus antisemitism and anti-Israeli bias, costing Dr. Laps critical years of his career, and costing the world the potential fruits of his talents.”