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FIRST ON FOX: In a Jan. 29 government order, President Donald Trump directed further measures to battle antisemitism, noting that Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, terror assaults in Israel spawned “an unprecedented wave of vile anti-Semitic discrimination, vandalism, and violence towards our residents, particularly in our faculties and on our campuses.”
Leo Terrell, senior counsel to the assistant lawyer common for civil rights who’s heading up a brand new Justice Division Activity Pressure to Fight Antisemitism, instructed Fox Information Digital that the president has directed his job drive “to make use of each instrument in our toolbox as Division of Justice to cease this antisemitic conduct.”
He added that Legal professional Normal Pam Bondi “has been following President Trump’s directive. … She has given me the inexperienced mild to do all the things doable and use the ability of the federal authorities to cease this.”
Terrell mentioned that since Oct. 7, the nation “has turned its again on Jewish Individuals at faculties in day-to-day life,” with Jewish Individuals not being “protected like different residents,” together with at schools and in Ok-12 faculties.
Antisemitic prejudice seems to be thriving inside New York Metropolis Public Faculties. A stress group referred to as the New York Public Faculties Alliance, a community of involved academics, college students and directors led by co-founder Karen Feldman, undertook an investigation into alleged anti-Jewish, anti-Israel and anti-American prejudice inside the metropolis’s public faculties in October 2024.
The group mentioned its findings display a failure to guard academics and college students towards discrimination, the presence of implicitly and explicitly biased supplies in training and curriculum improvement, and an environment of political activism in faculties that has “deepened divisions.”
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Anti-Israel protesters stand outdoors the Susan E. Wagner Excessive College in Staten Island. (Ary Weiss/Staten Island Shomrim)
A number of sources who spoke to Fox Information Digital famous with explicit concern the ambiance of antisemitism on the Susan E. Wagner Excessive College in Staten Island, which was the topic of a Fox Information Digital report final spring.
New York Metropolis Council member David Carr instructed Fox Information Digital that many mother and father of Susan E. Wagner college students contacted him with considerations about what they perceived as hatred on show on the faculty’s Worldwide Competition in January. Carr mentioned the occasion is often a “fantastic celebration” by the college’s “extremely numerous pupil physique,” however this yr there have been individuals within the viewers who shouted “Free Palestine” because the Israeli Scholar Membership completed every of its three performances.
Carr mentioned there have been further antisemitic remarks made concerning the college students earlier than they took the stage throughout their last efficiency. Carr mentioned the spectators “had been escorted out of the venue and … have been banned from returning for future occasions.”
A pupil from Susan E. Wagner Excessive College who spoke on situation of anonymity instructed Fox Information Digital that the scholars who had been faraway from the constructing referred to as out “smelly Jews” as dancers with the Israeli Membership made their technique to the stage. The scholar was not conscious of the repercussions for the viewers members however mentioned that faculty personnel apologized to offending viewers members whereas escorting them from the power.
Leo Terrell (Christian Monterrosa/Bloomberg through Getty Photos)
Carr mentioned he has “spoken to the college management, and we’re going to be speaking once more” with the objective of making “an environment the place everyone feels snug.” He added that “it clearly must be an ongoing dialog.”
“It’s unacceptable that college students be subjected to hate speech,” Carr mentioned. “Antisemitism is probably the most pernicious type of hate, I believe, in human historical past,” he defined. “It must be stood as much as at any time when it rears its ugly head.”
The Susan E. Wagner pupil who shared their considerations with Fox Information Digital mentioned college students haven’t solely endured hate speech of their faculty, however a number of workers members have worn pro-Palestine paraphernalia. Although some academics “by no means mentioned something” discriminatory, the coed mentioned that “you continue to know what they suppose.”
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Wagner directors have additionally allegedly participated in programming that promotes a one-sided interpretation of the Israel-Gaza battle. In April 2024, the Wagner Arab Scholar Affiliation posted on Instagram that it hosted a “survivor of the continuing genocide in Gaza” to talk to college students, with academics and Principal David Cugini current.
The scholar mentioned that in an surroundings of anti-Israel sentiment, “[N]obody needs to say something, as a result of they’re so positive that nothing will get performed. That’s what the college has performed. It has just about proven these children that it doesn’t matter what you do … Jewish children are simply going to be on the backside of the meals chain.”
Fox Information Digital obtained {a photograph} of the pro-Hamas slogan “Free Palestine. From the River to the Sea” scrawled on a trainer’s blackboard on the Susan E. Wagner Excessive College. (Fox Information Digital)
A part of this silencing additionally seems to contain mislabeling reported incidents of antisemitic hate.
The New York Metropolis Public College Alliance confirmed Fox Information Digital 5 New York Metropolis faculty prevalence experiences that described acts of alleged anti-Israel or antisemitic hate reported by workers and college students at a wide range of public faculties. Every was recorded as not being bias-related.
Fox Information Digital requested interim Superintendent Roderick Palton and Cugini about quite a few the aforementioned incidents, the strategies of recording antisemitic incidents and whether or not Jewish college students have a secure studying surroundings on the Susan E. Wagner Excessive College. They didn’t reply.
A New York Metropolis Division of Training spokesperson instructed Fox Information Digital that New York Metropolis Public Faculties (NYCPS) had been participating in coaching and workshops to “foster respectful and empathetic classroom dialog on troublesome subjects.” The spokesperson talked about that “our Hidden Voices curricular sources spotlight the varied communities and experiences of New Yorkers, together with the AAPI group, LGBTQ group, Individuals with Disabilities, and the World African Diaspora. To fulfill this second throughout our metropolis, we’re presently increasing Hidden Voices to incorporate each the Jewish American and Muslim American communities.”
The NYCPS Alliance report cites the Hidden Voices curriculum as containing classes that “emphasize resistance to colonialism, oppression, and marginalization.” The report says “the tendency to current incomplete or one-sided narratives could contribute to biased worldviews, doubtlessly fostering a hostile studying surroundings for Jewish college students. These supplies increase considerations about whether or not the college is assembly its obligations to offer a harassment-free and inclusive surroundings for all college students.”
A professional-Israel supporter holds an indication throughout the March for Israel on the Nationwide Mall in Washington on Nov. 14, 2023. (Michael Nigro/Pacific Press/LightRocket through Getty Photos)
In accordance with the faculties’ spokesperson, “[R]eligious bias incidents in our faculties [are] down by 46% thus far this yr.” The spokesperson defined that “we’re working carefully with this faculty to make sure that experiences of anti-Semitism or different bias are swiftly investigated and penalties are imposed for any violations of our insurance policies so that each pupil feels secure and revered of their faculty.”
Feldman questioned the findings. “I discover it fascinating how they may assess [a] 46% lower after they’re not even logging the incidents of Jewish hate correctly. They are not even logging it as biased incidents,” she instructed Fox Information Digital.
Feldman additionally expressed alarm on the surroundings at Susan E. Wagner, the place directors are “witness to the indoctrination and the twist of historical past” and the “worry, intimidation, [and] silencing ways” that permit incidents to “go unreported or unresolved.”
“These children are being guided poorly by their faculty. They’re not being supported. They really feel alienated. They really feel threatened,” she mentioned. Whereas “it’s displaying up as antisemitism now,” Feldman warned that anti-Jewish prejudice is “an alarm system. It’s a warning signal that one thing is rotten in society.”
Terrell famous a number of coming adjustments that can shield Jewish college students and academics who really feel they don’t seem to be being heard by their very own faculties. These embrace a “grievance quantity that’s going to come back on to the duty drive” for victims of antisemitic prejudice.
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“Assistance is on its means,” Terrell mentioned.
Fox Information Digital reached out to New York Metropolis Mayor Eric Adams concerning the ambiance of antisemitism within the metropolis’s public faculties however obtained no reply.
Beth Bailey is a reporter overlaying Afghanistan, the Center East, Asia, and Central America. She was previously a civilian intelligence analyst with the Division of the Military. You possibly can observe Beth on Twitter @BWBailey85
