This week, an Ohio medical facility has revealed that it fired one of its doctors in September last year after it transpired that she had threatened to "purposely" give Jewish people the wrong medication. Lara Kollab, a 27-year-old supervised medical resident at the Cleveland Clinic, lost her job when old antisemitic tweets of hers were unearthed.
The hateful content was made public knowledge by Canary Mission, a website that "documents individuals and organizations that promote hatred of the USA, Israel, and Jews on North American college campuses." On their page, they named and shamed Kollab, and shared images of racist tweets and statements she had posted - one of which read, "hahha ewww.. ill purposely give all the yahood [Jews] the wrong meds…"
"Lara Kollab has called for violence against Jews, spread anti-Semitism, trivialized the Holocaust, defended the terror organization Hamas and supported terrorists on Twitter," Canary Mission revealed. "She has also compared Israel to Nazi Germany, spread anti-Semitic conspiracy theories and hatred of Israel, and accused Israel of exploiting the Holocaust."
In a number of other tweets, Kollab expressed hatred of Jewish people and compared Israel to Nazi Germany.
"Jewish settlers in palestine are the descendants of the nazis," said one 2012 tweet.
"Tell me what makes Israel's ‘we must remain a Jewish state’ obsession any less disturbing than Hitler's obsession with a pure white nation," said another from 2013.
A spokesperson for the Cleveland Clinic, Eileen Sheil, said that Kollab was suspended as soon as the hospital was made aware of the tweets.
"Her departure was related to those posts and she has not worked at Cleveland Clinic since September," said a statement from hospital staff issued on January 2nd.
"For first-year residents, multiple safeguards and direct supervision are required for patient care and prescribing medicine. In addition, there have been no reports of any patient harm related to her work during the time she was here," the statement said. "In no way do these beliefs reflect those of our organization. We fully embrace diversity, inclusion and a culture of safety and respect across our entire health system."
Kollab's former university, the Touro College of Osteopathic Medicine in New York, also made a statement about the doctor, and made it clear that they in no way supported her beliefs.
"Touro College is appalled by the anti-Semitic comments reportedly made by Lara Kollab, a graduate of the Touro College of Osteopathic Medicine," they said.
"The mission of Touro College is to educate, perpetuate and enrich the historic Jewish tradition of tolerance and dignity. We are shocked that one of our graduates would voice statements that are antithetical to Touro and to the physicians’ Hippocratic Oath.
"We have received word from the Cleveland Clinic where Dr. Kollab was last affiliated and learned that she is no longer employed there."
Kollab was also found to have been using the alias Elle Kay on Instagram and Twitter, and her posts there have since been exposed, too.
The 27-year-old only received her training medical license last year, meaning it is not set to expire until 2021.
