A New York City Department of Education social worker who serves as the official anti-bullying ambassador at her Manhattan high school, responsible for protecting students from discrimination and bias, has been identified as the author of blatantly antisemitic social media posts, including images of insects posted in response to a video of Jewish men and children celebrating Lag Ba’Omer.

Lauren Camiolo, 40, a social worker at Landmark High School in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, uploaded images of beetles on four separate occasions in response to a Facebook video of Jewish men dancing in celebration of Lag Ba’Omer, the yahrtzeit of Rebbe Shimon bar Yochai.

The comparison of Jews to insects — a staple of Nazi propaganda — has triggered sharp condemnation from Jewish advocacy groups, educators, and communal leaders.

What lends the episode an added dimension of bitter irony is Camiolo’s official role at the school: she serves as the Landmark High School’s Respect for All liaison, a DOE-designated position whose explicit mandate is to “foster and maintain safe learning environments that are supportive, inclusive, and free from discrimination, harassment, and intimidation of any kind.”

“That’s a very dangerous and antisemitic trope coming from Nazi Germany, where Hitler would categorize Jews as subhuman and insects,”  Karen Feldman, president of the New York City Public Schools Alliance told the NY Post. “When a Jewish student faces discrimination or bias, they have no one to go to if their Respect for All liaison traffics in antisemitism.”

Moshe Spern, president of United Jewish Teachers, was equally direct. “Hitler often called Jewish people insects and pests. This is a direct act of antisemitism. Too many educators use their political beliefs to hurt Jewish students and fellow educators.”

Camiolo’s social media activity, which has been widely circulated, extends beyond the Lag Ba’Omer incident. Her Facebook page contains numerous posts expressing hostility toward Israel and Jewish identity. Among them: “Chosen people do not steal & harvest they create” (July 2025); “Zionism is a cult, a group of people incapable of thinking for themselves” (October 2025); and a post superimposed over an image of the Ten Commandments reading, “Genocide bloodshed of women & children on holy land by colonizers in the name of God that they will never know.”

Belaaz uncovered a Facebook post in which Camiolo responded to a video reporting on the terror attack on a Michigan synagogue carried out by Islamic terrorist Ayman Ghazali, by deflecting attention away from the attack entirely. “Israel and and [sic] America bombed a school,” she wrote beneath the post. “No one cares.

The posts do not stop at anti-Israel sentiment. Camiolo’s Facebook page also contains explicitly anti-white content, including “Never trust a white woman,” captioned beneath a photo of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton greeting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and “Never forget white women owned slaves & had them raise their children” (June 2025). The Respect for All program, by contrast, explicitly lists “color” and “religion” among the protected categories its liaisons are obligated to uphold.

Camiolo, who public records show has been employed by the DOE since at least 2020 and earned $115,665 in 2025, threatened to contact police when reached for comment by the New York Post, which first reported the story. “I’m Jewish… I’m also biracial,” she claimed, adding that she feared for her and her son’s safety.

A source at the school described Camiolo as “unhinged,” saying that students avoid seeking her out and that colleagues have raised concerns about her conduct as a social worker.

Landmark High School, which serves approximately 294 students and uses project-based assessments in lieu of Regents examinations, was founded in 1994.

A DOE spokesperson said the department “unequivocally condemn[s] any behaviors that represent antisemitism, and any forms of intolerance and prejudice,” and added that staff members who exhibit such behavior “will be investigated and will be subject to discipline as appropriate.”