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Jewish student physically assaulted at school which already has alleged history of racist bullying

A Jewish student at Desborough College, a school in Maidenhead, was allegedly physically assaulted by fellow students. 

According to the father of the student, his son, whose identity has been kept anonymous, has experienced multiple incidents of bullying following the barbaric attacks carried out by Hamas, an antisemitic genocidal terror organisation, in Israel on 7th October last year.

Since the attacks, antisemitism in Britain has skyrocketed, including a reported 1,350% increase in hate crimes against Jewish people. 

In November last year, the student was allegedly physically attacked by students who were shouting, “f*** Israel” and performing Nazi salutes. The students also allegedly threatened to hurt or kill him if he reported the incident. The school sanctioned these students in January but did not exclude them.

Earlier this year, another student allegedly shouted at the Jewish boy: “From the river to the sea, Palestine must be free.” The genocidal chant ‘From the River to the Sea’, which is regularly heard at anti-Israel protests, refers to the Jordan River and Mediterranean Sea, and, whether intended or not, is widely understood to represent a call for the destruction of the world’s only Jewish state — and its replacement with a Palestinian state. It is reasonably interpreted to be a call for the annihilation of half the world’s Jews, who live in Israel. 

In March, whilst waiting for a bus after school, two students allegedly approached the victim and accused him of “supporting the genocide of Palestinians”. In a separate incident, also in March, another student allegedly shouted at his friends when the victim was with them: “Stop talking to [name] because he supports genocide.”

According to the International Definition of Antisemitism, “Holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the State of Israel” is an example of antisemitism.

According to a “Stage 2 outcome letter” addressed to the father of the Jewish pupil from the Pioneer Educational Trust, the trust that oversees the school, three complaints were made to the Trust, which were summarised as follows:

1) “Handling of incidents involving religiously aggravated assaults and malicious communications and the failure of AM (Assistant Master) to address these incidents in a timely manner according to practices and policies advertised by the school’ extending to ‘the lack of cooperation, imposition of unnecessary hurdles for parents seeking resolution, and misguided responses that do not align with the official policies of the school.

2) “Recent incident of repeat victimisation outside the school is a direct result of its inability to enforce the school’s own policies.

3) “The school failed to change the timetable of one of the perpetrators and effectively put him into the same class with [the victim] causing stress and anxiety to [the victim].”

For all three complaints, the Trust resolved to deliver “a management response” where there had been a “failure to apply school policies and practices”. 

For the first complaint, the Trust recommended “further training” in terms of pastoral care and “timely and appropriate communications with parents” for its school leaders, as well as “further messaging and support to staff about the school’s policy on mobile phones”. 

Regarding the second complaint, the Trust committed to an “appropriate package of leadership training to ensure and assure school policies and practices are implemented robustly” and to “continue to implement a programme of anti-racist education, including assemblies, tutor programme and PSHE (Personal Health and Social Education)”.

The school reportedly has a recent history of racist bullying, when a black student found dozens of notes on their desk, including one that said: “Go back to the plantation.” 

The police became involved in an investigation into that incident, and Desborough College said regarding the matter: “Our aim as a school is to provide a safe, nurturing and welcoming environment so that every pupil, colleague and family member feels welcome in our community.”

The father escalated the complaint further through the school’s complaints procedure as he felt that the school’s response to the recent alleged antisemitic incidents was inadequate and failed to address the issue at hand. He thought that, given that the school has an alleged history of racist bullying, its promises were too vague and had no immediate resolution.  

The complaint was considered by the Trust’s Complaint Appeal Panel, which partially upheld one of the father’s requests for the Trust “to conduct a thorough investigation into the School’s leadership, policy and application of policy and whether it is sufficient to ensure a ‘secure, inclusive environment that actively combats racism, including anti-semitism [sic]’”.

According to a letter sent to the Jewish student’s father, the Panel stated: “It is noted that the Director of Education has been tasked with regular oversight and review of the school’s policies and procedures and that the School and the Trust have multiple layers of scrutiny over policy and performance as a matter of course.

“In light of the seriousness of the issue and the crucial importance to the Trust, the Panel recommends an appropriate sub-committee of the Trust Board (which should include any appropriate link-Trustees) is convened by the Chair of the Trust Board and to which the Director of Education should report with his periodic review. It is important to the Trust Board that the anti-racist policy and procedure at Desborough is comprehensive and effective and the subcommittee should be assured of that on behalf of the Trust Board in addition to usual reviews.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism is assisting the family of the victim.

A spokesperson for Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “It is harrowing that a Jewish child has had to endure such vile bullying apparently for the mere fact that he is Jewish. Schools should be environments where pupils are taught values of tolerance and harmony, not where pupils can expect to be verbally and violently assaulted because of their ethnicity. The school’s response has been utterly lacklustre and has, understandably, failed to inspire the confidence of the victim’s family that the school understands the gravity of these incidents or that their child will be protected. We are continuing to support the victim and his family throughout this painful ordeal.”

If you are concerned about antisemitism at your child’s school, please contact us in confidence on 0330 822 0321, or e-mail [email protected].

Image credit: Google

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What does this election result mean for British Jews?

The Labour Party arrives in Government as levels of anti-Jewish racism have skyrocketed and rocked the Jewish community for months. Our polling of British Jews is proof of the widespread fear that antisemitic extremists in our country are now completely out of control, with the effects of their hatred most visible on our streets and our campuses.

So far, precious little has been done to tackle this outpouring of hatred and we are making urgent proposals to the new Government, seeking firm action to halt the surge of Jew-hatred in Britain.

Labour has had to confront rampant antisemitism in its midst in recent years, and we hope that at this time of need it will do what is necessary to confront antisemitism in society, and defend this country’s Jewish community.

Two other noteworthy local results were in Islington North and Rochdale:

Jeremy Corbyn comfortably won his London seat as an Independent. This is the man who led Labour from being an anti-racist party to becoming the first ever political party found by the Equality and Human Rights Commission to have unlawfully discriminated against, harassed and victimised Jews, following our referral. At a time of record-breaking antisemitism, the man who used to call Hamas his “friends” and oversaw the normalisation of Jew-hatred in one of the most shameful episodes of modern British politics is back making our laws. Many British Jews will find it hard not to read into this.

George Galloway narrowly lost his Rochdale seat, which he had won in a by-election earlier this year (the Labour candidate was suspended by the Party in relation to antisemitism allegations which we helped to publicise). Given Mr Galloway’s track record and the situation currently faced by Jews in this country, it seems unlikely that many in the Jewish community will be mourning his departure from the institution that makes our laws.

But the real stories of this election were beneath the surface.

First, the fragmentation of our politics. While the Labour Party won a landslide, it was with fewer votes than Jeremy Corbyn had won, and with one of the smallest vote shares of any winning party in modern British history. The Conservatives, meanwhile, suffered their worst-ever defeat, in an election with one of the lowest turnouts in recent times.

Taken together, it meant that the main parties haemorrhaged more vote share than ever to smaller parties, with the Liberal Democrats, Reform UK and the Greens all breaking records in votes or seats. Numerous candidates for the latter two parties faced serious antisemitism allegations during the campaign following our revelations, albeit not those who ultimately won seats. In Northern Ireland, meanwhile, Sinn Fein became the largest party for the first time.

Regardless of one’s political views, this result clearly represents heightened scepticism about our nation’s institutions – a feeling apparently shared across the Channel as well, judging by the recent French election results. While the Jewish community may share some of this disillusionment, given the failures of the authorities to act decisively against the antisemites over the past several months, it also cannot be forgotten that political and societal instability also tend to pose unique risks to the Jews.

Second, the Gaza vote. One of the biggest stories from this general election has been the rise of sectarianism in our politics. The emergence of single-issue pressure groups purporting to represent particular communities risks pitting certain communities against others. It is an extremely worrying omen for our politics, and all major parties must be absolutely resolute in their rejection of its implications.

The prospect of a handful of MPs – some of whom have records of grossly inflammatory language – bringing what seems to be a single-minded obsession with Gaza to Parliament is not a positive development.

Jeremy Corbyn declared on election day, “Today, Palestine is on the ballot,” and promised that he would “stand up for the people of Gaza” and fight for “an end to the occupation of Palestine”. He was joined in victory by four other Independents who ran on the Gaza issue: Ayoub Khan in Birmingham Perry Barr, Adnan Hussain in Blackburn, Iqbal Mohamed in Dewsbury and Batley, and Shockat Adam in Leicester South – where Shadow Cabinet member Jonathan Ashworth was defeated.

We have published an exposé on these new MPs.

Meanwhile, Health Secretary Wes Streeting and prominent backbencher Jess Phillips were among several more Labour MPs who only narrowly escaped defeat by other Gaza candidates, whose presence was felt in many constituencies across the country.

As a Parliamentary grouping, this Gaza caucus is level with Reform UK on five MPs, outranking the Greens and Plaid Cymru.

It is difficult to think of another instance in modern times when a foreign policy issue in which Britain is not directly involved has captured so much attention at home as to bring our streets to a standstill week after week, undermine many of our major institutions, and bring more MPs to Parliament than even some long-established parties – with numerous more candidates only narrowly missing out.

Why this foreign policy issue in particular? The Jewish community believes that it knows why, and it will take a fundamental reset of our political culture to convince British Jews that they have nothing to fear from this ominous development.

What we do know is that all of the attention on Gaza in the UK is not bringing peace to the Middle East but spreading hatred here at home. We have sought to promote that message.

BBC lets Gaza propaganda go unchallenged

One of the reasons that Gaza candidates do so well is that our broadcasters allow unverified statistics and propaganda to go unchallenged – and sometimes even repeat it.

Recently, BBC Newsnight allowed a panelist – the climate activist Mikaela Loach – to say: “The Lancet yesterday, in one of their reports, said that the death toll [in Gaza] is probably more likely to be more than 186,000 people.” The host did not challenge this assertion.

For context, the so-called “report” to which Ms Loach was referring is simply a letter to The Lancet – the prestigious medical journal – by readers with documented hostility toward Israel. It is not a peer-reviewed study nor a figure which the journal has endorsed. It is not even an estimate of current deaths. It is a speculative estimate about a future, final death toll that includes excess deaths and other categories. Indeed the letter itself acknowledges that even Hamas, a proscribed antisemitic genocidal terror organisation, estimates the current death toll at around 37,396, a figure that does not differentiate between combatants and non-combatants and which has been revised downwards considerably by the United Nations.

Given how controversial these statistics have proven, it is not possible that the host of a debate on Newsnight could plausibly plead ignorance of this issue.

We are submitting a complaint to the BBC. It will be just the latest of the many complaints that we have submitted to our national broadcaster in recent months.

While our broadcasters are failing in their duty, one social media company is making an effort.

Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, has announced: “We will now remove speech targeting ‘Zionists’ in several areas where our process showed that the speech tends to be used to refer to Jews and Israelis with dehumanising comparisons, calls for harm, or denials of existence.”

Our polling shows that eight in ten British Jews consider themselves to be a Zionist. Only six percent do not.

While there is still more work to be done in combatting online antisemitism, this is certainly a step in the right direction.

“They use the Holocaust as a sort of cover”

Last week, Newham, Tower Hamlets and Redbridge National Education Union (NEU) hosted an event “in association with” the Newham, Tower Hamlets and Redbridge branches of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC). According to an online flyer for the event, the supposed conference would include “workshops on antisemitism and anti-Zionism”.

Attendees at the antisemitism workshop were told: “They use the Holocaust as a sort of cover”; “It makes me very angry when people talk about the Jewish community because there’s no such thing”; and “Israel is nothing to do with being Jewish”; among other outrageous remarks.

It appears that this so-called workshop was rife with antisemitism, from comparisons of Israel to Nazi Germany, to allegations that the Jewish state was somehow complicit in the murder of its own people on 7th October, to characterising Israel as a ‘racist endeavour’, to describing Zionism as a virus, to the wild claim that Israel ‘wanted the Holocaust to happen’.

Both the PSC and NEU have long histories of causing distress to the Jewish community. You can listen to excerpts from the here, which we have published exclusively.

No expulsion for Sir Alan Duncan

The former Conservative MP and Minister, Sir Alan Duncan, recently suggested on-air that members of the House of Lords were working at the behest of the Israeli state, and that was not the first time that he had made such an assertion. We submitted a complaint to the Party and urged the Conservatives to expel him as a member.

However, a spokesperson for the Conservative Party has now said: “Following a two-month investigation, an independent panel has reviewed the complaint and dismissed it.”

At a time when antisemitism is at an all-time-high, invoking conspiracy theories and tropes about dual loyalty only inflames the situation for British Jews. This is a shameful decision, and we are aware of members resigning from the Party in response.

The new Government comes into office facing an array of challenges. For the Jewish community, skyrocketing antisemitism is among the most important. Sir Keir Starmer has shown a willingness to confront antisemites in his own party. Now he must do it in wider society, and ensure that the authorities do so as well.

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Attendees at PSC “antisemitism training” at local National Education Union event told “Israel is the biggest amplifier of antisemitism there is”

Last night, Newham, Tower Hamlets and Redbridge National Education Union (NEU) hosted an event “in association with” the Newham, Tower Hamlets and Redbridge branches of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC). 

PSC is known to regularly organise national anti-Israel demonstrations and earlier this year, its Director, Ben Jamal, encouraged thousands of protestors to “ramp up pressure on MPs” and flood into Parliament “so that they would have to lock the doors of Parliament itself”.

The event, which took place in Newham, East London, was titled, “How to talk about Palestine in our schools”. According to an online flyer for the event, the supposed conference would include “workshops on antisemitism and anti-Zionism”. 

Approximately 40 people attended the event, which was open to parents, carers, youth-workers and the general public. Attendees were split into smaller workshops to talk about specific topics. 

Several people, including three children, attended a workshop on antisemitism and anti-Zionism, which was led by two representatives of the PSC. The discussion in the workshop was primarily focused on criticising the widely-accepted International Definition of Antisemitism, which was reportedly dubbed “the bad one”, whilst promoting the adoption of the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism, which was allegedly referred to as “the good one”. 

The Jerusalem Declaration is a wrecking document intended to undermine the globally-recognised Definition.

In the supposed critique of the International Definition, the PSC representatives allegedly said: “Speak against Israel, oh you’re antisemitic,” and “If people say something against Israel, they say it is antisemitic.” 

Another reported comment regarding the Definition was: “They use the Holocaust as a sort of cover because it says once you’ve got Holocaust in there, it must be right.”

During the workshop, the PSC session leaders allegedly claimed that “Israel is nothing to do with being Jewish” and are understood to have told attendees that “if you’re anti-racist you’re anti-the-State-of-Israel.” 

One of the representatives allegedly stated: “Israel is a racist endeavour.” According to the International Definition, “Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination (e.g. by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavour)” is an example of antisemitism. 

Organisers were also heard saying: “A large proportion of the people killed on October the 7th were killed by the Israeli army,” before going on to later claim that Israel has not fought for its hostages that currently remain in Gaza. 

On 7th October last year, Hamas, an antisemitic genocidal terror organisation, carried out barbaric attacks in Israel, massacring over 1,200 Israelis and taking some 250 hostage. The event has since been described as the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust. 

Astonishingly, these claims were not the only controversial statements that were heard at the workshop. One PSC representative was heard stating: “The Nazis were ashamed of the gas chambers, sadly Israel is not ashamed of what it’s doing in Gaza,” and “Gaza is not an open-air prison camp, it is an open-air ghetto in the same way that our ancestors were kept in ghettos before they were murdered.”

According to the International Definition, “Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis” is an example of antisemitism. 

In yet another sickening comparison to the Holocaust, a representative allegedly said: “Like the Nazis, [Israel] wanted to keep the Holocaust quiet because it didn’t play into their narrative.” 

Attenders were also given supplementary written materials, which included a “further reading” list. On the list was Norman Finkelstein’s The Holocaust Industry. Mr Finkelstein is a controversial American activist who once praised Holocaust-denier David Irving at a pro-Corbyn meeting of Labour Against the Witchhunt, an antisemitism-denial group of former and expelled Labour members.

Other claims that were heard throughout the event were: “They [Israel] wanted the Holocaust to happen,” and “Israel is the biggest amplifier of antisemitism there is.”

A clear theme throughout the workshop was opposition to Zionism, the embodiment of the Jewish right to self-determination. Attendees reported that organisers compared Zionism to a “virus” and asserted that “too many Jews” have been “injected” with it. 

Eight in ten British Jews consider themselves to be a Zionist. Only six percent do not, according to our representative polling. 

This is not the first time that the PSC has found itself at the centre of an antisemitism-related controversy, with many of its rallies being host to antisemitic placards and rhetoric. A month-long investigation by Campaign Against Antisemitism in 2017 exposed extensive antisemitic bigotry amongst PSC supporters on social media. Last year, the PSC Brixton published an Instagram post calling Zionists “brainwashed racists” who should be fired from their places of work.

The General Secretary of the NEU also has a controversial record when it comes to antisemitism.

A spokesperson for Campaign Against Antisemitism: “It appears that this so-called workshop was rife with antisemitism. This conference had it all, from comparisons of Israel to Nazi Germany, to allegations that the Jewish State was somehow complicit in the murder of its own people on 7th October, to characterising Israel as a ‘racist endeavour’, to describing Zionism as a virus, to the wild claim that Israel ‘wanted the Holocaust to happen’.

“What makes the whole thing even more appalling, is that it was organised by the National Education Union ‘in association with’ members of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Both organisations have a long history of causing distress to the Jewish community. The only silver lining of this conspiracy-fuelled event is that it was so very poorly attended.”

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Ohio member of school board delivers Nazi salute at meeting

A woman has apologised after she came under fire for making a Nazi salute at a public meeting. 

Anne Zakkour, who is a member of the Tipp City Board of Education, performed the salute and quietly said, “sieg heil” after the President of the Board asked her not to interrupt him.

Initially, when approached by a local Jewish media outlet, Ms Zakkour said that the President of the Board, Simon Patry, “[had] a dictator mentality” and explained that the salute was a “sarcastic gesture” which was “[in] no way meant to be anything towards the Jewish people”.

She continued: “If we don’t identify, even at a local level, if we don’t call out suppression and oppression, I’m not an expert at this, but isn’t that how some of this snowballed with Hitler and Nazism?”

After Ms Zakkour received further backlash, particularly from two Jewish groups that sit on the school board, she expressed regret for her conduct. 

In an e-mail, Ms Zakkour wrote: “In hindsight, I regret having done this…After four years of attacks by a board member that I believe has been acting as a dictator spreading lies and division, my action was spur of the moment and I’m very sorry for that. My heart is open to all religions, and it was never my intent to offend anyone of the Jewish community. [sic]”

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism throughout the United States.

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Antisemitic graffiti discovered in San Francisco school 

Antisemitic graffiti has been discovered at Commodore Sloat Elementary School in San Francisco. 

Over twenty pieces of vandalism were found on the school’s playground as well as on playground equipment and a library book exchange. 

One of the markings depicted a crossed-out Star of David with text underneath it that read: “f*** Jews.”

The incidents are being investigated by the local authorities. 

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism throughout the United States.

Image credit: Google

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CAA delivers training at Claremont Senior School following reports of antisemitic incidents

Campaign Against Antisemitism recently delivered training at Claremont Senior School in East Sussex.

The training came in response to a request from the parent of a child at the school after their child had experienced a number of incidents of antisemitism.

Campaign Against Antisemitism delivered the training in two sessions: one for staff and one for students. The sessions covered Jewish identity; the origins of antisemitism; how to recognise antisemitism; conspiracy theories; and how antisemitism might find expression in the classroom and how it can manifest in daily life. 

Campaign Against Antisemitism regularly provides antisemitism training to schools, university societies, police forces, regulators and public bodies, and recently gave training to the Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust.

If you would like to arrange antisemitism training for your organisation, please e-mail [email protected].

If you wish to report an incident of antisemitism at your child’s school, please e-mail us at [email protected] or call +44 (0)330 822 0321.

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Swastikas found in Nassau school playground

Antisemitic graffiti has been discovered on playground equipment at Chatterton School in Nassau County.

The vandalism consists of two swastikas, which appear to have been spray-painted onto the equipment. 

The vandalism was reported to the local authorities and is under investigation. 

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism throughout the United States.

Image credit: Google

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Man opened fire outside Memphis Jewish school 

Police shot a man after he opened fire with a handgun outside Margolin Hebrew Academy in Memphis, Tennessee. 

The man reportedly tried to enter the school’s premises but was unable to do so due to the double security doors.

He then fled the scene in a pick-up truck, which was later located with the suspect inside the vehicle by local law enforcement. 

When approached by police, the armed man is understood to have gotten out of the truck. Police then shot at the suspect and wounded him before he was taken to hospital. 

Of the failed attack, Dan Crow, Assistant Police Chief of The Memphis Police Department, said: “Thankfully, that school had a great safety procedure and process in place and avoided anyone being harmed or injured at that scene.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism throughout the United States.

Image credit: Google

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EU commissioner supports suspending funding to Palestinian Authority due to antisemitism in textbooks

An EU commissioner has backed calls to suspend aid to the Palestinian Authority pending the removal of antisemitism from its textbooks. 

Oliver Varhelyi, the European Commissioner for Neighbourhood and Enlargement, expressed his support for the suspension following the passage of a resolution by the European Parliament. The resolution demands the suspension of aid to the Palestinian Authority for educational purposes until antisemitic rhetoric is removed from its textbooks.

According to Impact-se, an NGO which monitors educational resources used by Israel and the Palestinian Authority, the PA distributes study cards accusing Jews of being “in control of global events through financial power,” and sets assignments instructing children to describe Israeli soldiers as “Satan’s aides”.

Mr Varhelyi said: “Education for the next generation that supports peace, tolerance, coexistence and non-violence is a shared interest…We remain committed to deliver through constructive engagement with the Palestinian Authority, while reserving the right to take appropriate measures as necessary.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism worldwide.

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Hope Sussex Community to host antisemitic hate preacher David Icke at festival

Hope Sussex Community is reportedly due to host the antisemitic hate preacher and conspiracy theorist, David Icke, at an upcoming festival. 

According to its website, the group is “a community that loves, learns and grows together”. 

In the website’s section for “Education & Empowerment”, it reads: “State schools are unfit for purpose, they are increasingly pushing an agenda that is harmful and eroding to our society, while being falsely presented as ‘social progress’.”

It is understood that Hope Sussex Community is currently under investigation by Ofsted as a suspected unregulated illegal school. Earlier this year, the group denied allegations of teaching conspiracy theories. A spokesperson for the group said: “We teach [students] to think critically at all times and to question everything, to investigate themselves and not to believe the often harmful state propaganda peddled on our TV screens.”

Two of the organisation’s founders, Sadie Single and Matthew Single, are reported to be former members of the British National Party who were expelled in 2019 after they leaked personal details of the Party’s membership online.  

The organisation is currently advertising its festival, the “Freedom Music Festival”, for which Mr Icke is a “special guest”. 

Mr Icke uses social media, his books and his stage performances to incite hatred. His preaching is so absurd that since the 1990s he has been dismissed as a crank, but because he is dismissed, there has been no major opposition to him and he has built up a following of thousands upon thousands of disciples whom he has persuaded to adamantly believe that the world is in the grip of a conspiracy run by the “Rothschild Zionists”. His repertoire includes conspiracy myths and tropes classified as antisemitic according to the International Definition of Antisemitism, adopted by the British Government. Campaign Against Antisemitism has successfully persuaded some venues to pull out of hosting his events.

After years of pressure from Campaign Against Antisemitism, Mr Icke was banned from most social media platforms.

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Ottawa educational assistant reported to have praised terrorists

An Educational Assistant at a school in Ottawa has reportedly praised terrorists on social media. 

The media watchdog, Honest Reporting, has uncovered a number of historic online posts that appear to have been published by Abeer Mousa.

According to the expose, Ms Mousa posted a photo of Karim Younis earlier this year at Mr Younis’ mother’s grave following his release from prison. Mr Younis’ imprisonment followed his conviction for the kidnapping and murder of Israeli soldier Avraham Bromberg in 1983.

In another post from 2018, Ms Mousa appears to praise Dalal Mughrabi in Arabic as a “martyr” who “proved to the whole world that women are equal to men in sacrifice and self-sacrificing.” 

Ms Mughrabi was a Lebanese member of the Fatah faction of the Palestinian Liberation Organisation. She was involved in a notorious attack in Israel in 1978, in which a group of terrorists hijacked a bus with the goal of reaching the Israeli Knesset. The operation left 38 Israelis dead, which included thirteen children. 

In response to a tweet about the murder of the nineteen-year-old Israeli soldier, Omri Levy, Ms Mousa reportedly wrote in Arabic: “and hopefully [also] his father, his family and his entire people. May Allah burn them.” 

In another alleged post in Arabic from 2014, Ms Mousa appears to have written: “This enemy [Israel] doesn’t understand but the fight, the rifle, the stone, the car-ramming, the stabbing and the homeland [Palestine] will not be liberated without that. The rest is absolutely empty talk.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism throughout Canada, which have dramatically increased according to a recent audit.

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Antisemitic graffiti discovered at Canada primary school

Antisemitic graffiti has been discovered on the premises of a primary school in Peterborough, Canada.

The Peterborough Victoria Northumberland Clarington Catholic District School Board stated that the graffiti was discovered on the exterior of the school in several locations.

Peterborough police reported the incident and said that “it has been classified as a hate/bias crime.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism throughout Canada, which have dramatically increased according to a recent audit. 

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Report claims Saudi Arabia has removed “practically all antisemitic material” from Islamic Studies textbooks

Education authorities in Saudi Arabia have reportedly removed a substantial amount of antisemitic rhetoric from the Kingdom’s Islamic Studies textbooks. 

The research group IMPACT-se has been tracking the progress of the expungement of this material, and has reported that “practically all antisemitism” has been removed from Saudi Arabia’s Islamic Studies educational resources, which represents a significant improvement since the organisation’s 2020 report on the issue. 

Impact-se CEO Marcus Sheff stated: “This follows the previous removal of significant amounts of antisemitism in other subjects over the last four years. While all textbook reform is important, Islamic Studies textbooks are particularly consequential.”

“Highly inflammatory hadiths and texts” have been removed from textbooks, such as statements accusing Jews of being apostates who have “sold their souls,” according to the report. 

However, while many derogatory remarks were removed, the report has found that problems still remain. Zionism, for example, is described as a “Jewish racist political movement” that “aims to expel the Palestinian people and establish a Jewish state by force.”

The International Definition of Antisemitism lists “Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination (e.g. by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavour)” as an example of antisemitism.

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism worldwide.

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European Parliament calls for suspension of educational support to Palestinian Authority due to antisemitism in textbooks

The European Parliament has passed a resolution demanding the suspension of aid to the Palestinian Authority for educational purposes until antisemitic rhetoric is removed from its textbooks.

The vote took place on 10th May, with 421 votes in favour of calling on the European Commission to apply a suspension, out of the 577 votes cast by participating Parliamentarians. 

According to Impact-se, an NGO which monitors educational resources used by Israel and the Palestinian Authority, the PA distributes study cards accusing Jews of being “in control of global events through financial power,” and sets assignments instructing children to describe Israeli soldiers as “Satan’s aides”.

A similar resolution was passed by the European Parliament in May 2021, resulting in aid to the Palestinian Authority being frozen for thirteen months. However, aid recommenced in January 2022, after European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen stated “all the difficulties are gone.”

In 2020, Norway cut its funding to the PA over similar concerns, and the UK has done so as well, reportedly for other reasons.

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism worldwide.

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Police investigate Hizballah song being blasted outside Jewish school in London

A newly-surfaced video appears to show men in a car loudly playing a Hizballah song outside of a Jewish school in London.

In the video posted by the JC, men are seemingly seen singing and laughing in a car whilst filming a group of young children. A caption at the top says “Drove past the Zionist school on full blast” with three laughing emojis.

The translated song says: “We are Hizballah, be our witness, you son of the most righteous of prophets.” 

Comments on the original video, believed to have been first uploaded to TikTok, reportedly include remarks such as “Why not run them over? You missed the opportunity” from a user called “I hate kikes”.

Another comment allegedly said: “Ah my brother I know exactly where you are and what the school is around that corner! That’s brilliant what you did!!!”

The alleged incident took place on 26th April on the corner of Green Lane and Brent Street, between Hasmonean Primary School and the Independent Jewish Day School.

Reportedly, the original song was first published by Hamas. The words allegedly state that members “are immortalised by blood.” 

The incident is being investigated by police following reports from Campaign Against Antisemitism, CST and others.

In 2019, following a gruelling effort over several years by Campaign Against Antisemitism and our allies, Hizballah was completely proscribed by the Home Secretary, Sajid Javid, with the support of the Foreign Secretary, Jeremy Hunt.

Hizballah’s Secretary-General, Hassan Nasrallah, has previously said: “If Jews all gather in Israel, it will save us the trouble of going after them worldwide.” Hizballah has been true to its mission, bombing Jewish targets from Buenas Aires to Burgas, and it has even been blamed for setting off two bombs in London outside buildings used by Jews and Israelis.

A spokesperson for Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “It is a criminal offence to show support for a proscribed terrorist organisation and to incite racial or religious hatred. This incident is especially concerning, having targeted schoolchildren, and both the perpetrators and some of those who commented on the video must urgently face justice.”

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Antisemitic slurs directed at high school’s lacrosse team during match

Antisemitic slurs were directed at members of an Ohio high school’s lacrosse team. 

During a match on 1st May at Elyria Catholic High School, the slurs were shouted at Orange High School’s team, many of whose players are Jewish.

Orange’s Superintendent Lyn Campbell said: “We are actively investigating the situation, and details will be provided to Elyria Catholic so appropriate actions can be taken by their administration.”

This is the second time in the past year that Orange School’s lacrosse team has faced antisemitism during a game. In May 2022, Rachel Glazer, a student at Orange High School, reported that a member of Lake Catholic High School’s lacrosse team had a swastika drawn on his calf which was visible during the game. 

According to the FBI, over 60 percent of hate crimes against a religious minority are motivated by antisemitism.

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism throughout the United States.

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Antisemitic abuse circulated on school WhatsApp group in Sydney.

Antisemitic abuse has been found on a King’s School WhatsApp group.

Students at the prestigious private school in Sydney, New South Wales  exchanged antisemitic and racist rhetoric on a WhatsApp group called “Studies of Religion Group Chat” in late April. One pupil wrote:  “I’m cool with muzzlims and pretty much everyone as long as they aren’t J*wish or F*ench [sic].” Another pupil responded: “[student’s name] hates the jews [sic].”

Leading figures within the New South Wales Jewish community stated that they were “shocked and deeply saddened” by this incident. 

The New South Wales Government has introduced a portal through which students and families can digitally report incidents in future.

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism worldwide.

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Jewish teenager has swastika scratched into his skin by school bullies

A Jewish teenager was assaulted at his school in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Images have been circulated on social media of a swastika scratched into his skin. The incident was reported to have taken place on 30th March in a school in the Clark County School District (CCSD).

The FBI is investigating the case after the CCSD Police reported that “no evidence that would indicate the origins of the injuries” was found.

The CCSD also stated: “We will not tolerate discriminatory behaviours that contradict an inclusive community and impact student safety and well-being. If anyone has any additional information related to this case, we urge them to contact school police immediately.”

According to the FBI, over 60 percent of hate crimes against a religious minority are motivated by antisemitism.

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism throughout the United States.

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Incoming NEU General Secretary under fire as Union insists his past remarks did not intend to convey encouragement for violence against Jews

The incoming General Secretary of the National Education Union (NEU) has come under fire over his past remarks and appearances.

Daniel Kebede, an activist and teacher based in north-east England, is due to become the leading teachers’ union’s new General Secretary later this year. He is replacing Dr Mary Bousted and Kevin Courtney. Mr Courtney has been a magnet for controversy relating to Jewish people during his tenure.

Mr Kebede appeared at a rally in Newcastle in 2021, where the chant “Khaybar, oh Jews” was heard, a reference to the antisemitic “Jews, remember Khaybar, the army of Muhammad is returning” chant. The “Khaybar” chant is a classic Arabic battle cry referencing the massacre and expulsion of the Jews of the town of Khaybar in northwestern Arabia, now Saudi Arabia, in the year 628 CE. The chant has been heard in numerous anti-Israel rallies in Britain and abroad.

New video has emerged of Mr Kebede’s speech at the rally, which was organised by the inflammatory Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Although he is not seen in the video joining the chant, his remarks are caught on camera, in which he can be seen holding a microphone and saying that it is “time to stand together and oppose Apartheid, oppose occupation and fight for Palestinian liberation,” before going on to proclaim: “Let’s do it for Palestine, Ramallah, West Bank, Gaza – it’s about time we globalise the intifada.”

The “intifada” is widely understood as the campaign of Arab terrorist violence against Jewish Israeli targets in the early 2000s that claimed hundreds of civilian lives and brought an end to the peace process.

The rally took place in the same period as at least 25 members of the NEU from Jewish school JFS quit over concerns about antisemitism at the Union. At the time, Mr Courtney spoke at antisemitism-infested rallies, and Mr Kebede is now under scrutiny for having done so as well.

The new revelation comes after another union in the education sector, the National Union of Students (NUS), sacked its President late last year. She had a history of antisemitic and inflammatory comments. A ground-breaking report, into which Campaign Against Antisemitism and others provided input, was also published in January by Rebecca Tuck KC, finding that NUS created a “hostile environment” for Jews.

A spokesperson for the NEU said: “Daniel Kebede was present at a Palestine Solidarity Campaign rally in solidarity with Palestinians facing eviction in Sheikh Jarrah in 2021. In speaking to the rally Mr Kebede called for peace and justice in the Middle East and expressed solidarity with the Palestinian people.

“He used the slogan ‘globalise the intifada’ which is an expression of such solidarity, and of support for civic protests; it did not convey any support for violence. He wasn’t aware of the chanting of ‘Khaybar, oh Jews’ and both he and the National Education Union completely condemn such chants, all acts of antisemitism and any attacks on Jewish people.”

A spokesperson for Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “For the NEU to have to clarify that past remarks by its incoming General Secretary were not intended to encourage support for terrorist violence against Jewish targets around the world is hardly a promising start to his term in office. It would be a concerning development in any trade union, but we have helped Jewish teachers and staff who felt unable to turn to the NEU precisely because they do not feel that it is on the side of its Jewish members. Daniel Kebede’s inflammatory past rhetoric, and appearance at rallies where indisputably antisemitic chants were heard, will do nothing to stop the exodus of Jewish members or reassure those who remain.

“The NEU should follow in the footsteps of the NUS by admitting that it has historically had a dreadful relationship with its Jewish members and commissioning an independent investigation into its own conduct over recent years and that of its leadership.”

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Montgomery County MD schools rocked by multiple incidents of swastika graffiti

Schools in Montgomery County in Maryland have been rocked by multiple incidents of swastika graffiti in recent weeks.

In one incident, an antisemitic message was found on a desk at Magruder High School in Rockville. The principal described the graffiti as a “very serious racially insensitive incident.”

In another incident, an antisemitic flyer was reportedly discovered at Northwood High School.

Swastikas were also found on student desks at three separate schools – at Thomas S. Wootton High School, Tilden Middle School in Rockville, and Silver Creek Middle School in Kensington – earlier this year.

In December, a sign at Walt Whitman High School was vandalized with antisemitic graffiti, and, in November, antisemitic graffiti was found along the Bethesda Trolley Trail.

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism throughout the United States.

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New report reveals four in ten secondary school teachers have encountered antisemitism in class

A new study has revealed that four in ten secondary school teachers who teach about the Holocaust have witnessed antisemitism in the classroom.

According the research conducted by the UCL Centre for Holocaust Education, fifteen percent of teachers also said that they witnessed Holocaust denial from their students either “occasionally” or “often”, while three quarters of the teachers surveyed said that they had encountered students who had repeated falsehoods about the Holocaust that they had read online.

The study recommends that more time in schools be devoted to learning about the Holocaust and its contemporary relevance, particularly as previous research has indicated that the time for learning about the Holocaust is being reduced in the Key Stage 3 curriculum. The study further recommends that teachers are given more time and encouragement to access training to confront the issues that they may encounter in the classroom.

The study, titled, “Continuity and Change: Ten years of teaching and learning about the Holocaust in England’s secondary schools”, used a mixed method approach, including both extensive survey responses from 1,077 teachers who teach about the Holocaust, as well as quantitative data from group interviews with 134 teachers from 45 different schools across the country.

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Hamas denounces UAE’s inclusion of Holocaust education in curriculum

The genocidal antisemitic terrorist group Hamas has denounced the United Arab Emirates after the UAE decided to include education about the Holocaust in its curriculum.

A spokesperson for Hamas said: “We condemn and denounce the UAE embassy’s announcement in Washington that its country has included materials on the ‘Holocaust’ in its educational curricula, and we consider that support for the Zionist narrative and a form of cultural normalization.” The word “Holocaust” was written in scare quotes, indicating scepticism about its veracity.

The statement came shortly after the UAE said that “memorialising victims of the Holocaust is crucial,” and that “public figures and scholars should be encouraged to discuss the Holocaust and protect common human values while leaving political differences.”

Hamas has long opposed the teaching of the Holocaust in schools operated by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which is itself no stranger to controversy relating to antisemitism. Thirteen years ago, in an open letter to UNRWA, Hamas described the Holocaust as “a lie invented by the Zionists”, adding: “Regardless of the controversy, we oppose forcing the issue of the so-called Holocaust onto the syllabus, because it aims to reinforce acceptance of the occupation of Palestinian land.”

In 2011, a Hamas official called the Holocaust “a lie that has crumbled.”

In 2021, the UK banned Hamas in its entirety as a terrorist group following calls by Campaign Against Antisemitism and others.

Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on news and incidents relating to antisemitism worldwide.

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School apologises for staging Hitler play where students performed Nazi salutes

A school has apologised after it staged a play about Adolf Hitler, during which students performed Nazi salutes.

Actor Pip Utton, who played the role of Hitler in the controversial one-man play at Somerset’s Millfield School, defended the play and told the JC that he “manipulated” the students in attendance to into performing the salute.

“I told them we should thank the technicians because they rarely receive recognition. I said I wanted them to perform a special show of gratitude by raising their right arms in the air, then bring their hand down to clap their knee.

“As their hands went up I told them, ‘it seemed to work in Berlin’. I was in no way attempting to glorify that horrible, horrible salute. 

“The point was to show how people can be manipulated and how easy it is. Believe me, it is shocking for me to see it happen. They got the fact that it was kind of a joke because they were laughing about it.”

Further upset was reportedly caused by the fact that the play was staged mere hours before Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Hebrew calendar.

Mr Utton said that, had he known, he would have asked the school to reschedule the play, which he has been performing across the country for over 25 years.

The father of a Jewish student in attendance said of the play: “It made me feel sick. What on earth were the teachers thinking? It would not be appropriate to give this kind of play the green light for school children at any time, least of all on the eve of Yom Kippur. 

“The school must have known of the content and if not, it should have. There is no excuse for this disgraceful error of judgment.”

Millfield School Head Gavin Horgan has said that the students should not have been encouraged to “role play such actions”, stating: “We should not have staged this play. We are sorry for the hurt that has been caused and we have changed our approach to vetting performances so that this will never happen again.”

However, Mr Utton took issue with the school’s apology, branding it “spineless”.

Speaking to Times Radio, he said that he would be “sending the Head an e-mail and say that I think his reaction is unwarranted and completely spinless,” adding: “I don’t want to perform at the school again.”

He also revealed that this was not the first time that the play had received complaints, but questioned: “If [people] don’t understand [the play], should I apologise for them not being either intelligent or perceptive enough to understand?”

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Man reportedly defending Hitler and handing out flyers chased out of school by students in Larkhall

A man who reportedly defended Adolf Hitler and handed out flyers was seemingly chased out of school by students in Larkhall, Scotland.  

A video on Twitter appears to show a man speaking with schoolchildren in which he says: “Hitler wanted a country for white people. He also wanted a country for every other people.

“And, obviously, there was a small group of people who controlled all of the media, all of the banks, and this small group…they promoted pornography, promoted cultural marxism, and it destroyed Germany. Hitler took control of the media and the banks and put the interests of the German people first.”

When asked by a student “if the Holocaust is real,” the man replied: “No, it is not.”

The man’s t-shirt appeared to be adorned with a Nazi sonnendrad, or sun wheel, symbol. 

Later on in the video, an apparent confrontation takes place between the man and a student, prompting him to decry “I’m here to help you.” His manner then becomes aggressive and he states: “What the f*** are you gonna do?”

A 20-year-old man was arrested in connection with the incident and is scheduled to appear at Hamilton Sheriff Court on 22nd November.

Campaign Against Antisemitism closely monitors the far-right, which remains a dangerous threat to the Jewish community and other minority groups.

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New report shows antisemitic incidents in England’s schools trebled in five years

According to a recently-published report, antisemitic incidents in secondary schools in England have almost trebled in the last half-decade.

The findings, collated by researchers at the Henry Jackon Society think tank, were published exclusively in the JC using an investigation that used Freedom of Information requests on a scale previously not seen before, encompassing more than 3,000 English secondary schools. 

The results showed that there have been at least 1,000 antisemitic incidents in these schools, including 76 that were serious enough for teachers to have reported them to the police, and thirteen instances of students being physically assaulted by their peers.

One of the questions that formed the research asked how many incidents of pupil misconduct, bullying, harassment, or similar, in which the term “antisemitism” was recorded, had taken place in the period between 2017 and 2022.

However, very few – less than one in twenty – of the schools have policies in place to combat antisemitism, and only around 40 percent of the schools that were contacted even responded to the inquiry.

There were a total of 1,030 incidents reported for the period, at the start of which 60 incidents were recorded. That figure almost trebled to 164 in 2022.

581 incidents were recorded but not tied to a specific year within the given period. Given how few schools responded, the overall total may be far higher than this.

58 percent of the incidents involved Jewish students being mocked by others with reference to the Nazis or the Holocaust. This includes the apparently widespread practice of hissing at Jewish students to recreate what it might have sounded like in the gas chambers that the Nazis set up throughout Europe to exterminate Jews. This form of bullying reportedly often takes place after classes about the Holocaust.

Some of the incidents describe include a student who brought a copy of Hitler’s notorious autobiographical manifesto, Mein Kampf, into school and suggested that the class read it together. Another student at the same school discussed the “Jewish conspiracy” that controls the world during a personal development lesson. There were numerous examples of physical and verbal assault, as well as incidents that were not included in the report of pupils being forced to move schools due to the abuse and even Jewish teachers who have resigned rather than suffer antisemitism from their own students.

The report states that schools should adopt the International Definition of Antisemitism, that antisemitism policies should be mandatory in all schools, that Ofsted inspectors should assess antisemitism during inspections, and that the number of antisemitic incidents should be submitted to the Department of Education on an annual basis so that figures can be published.

Robert Halfon, Conservative Member of Parliament for Harlow, and chair of the House of Commons Education Select Committee, said: “This is horrific. It’s hard to believe that in 2022, Jewish students are being subjected to antisemitism and abuse of this kind – and yet nothing seems to be being done about it.”

Do you or your friends/family have stories of schoolteachers or pupils facing antisemitism at schools in the UK? We have received a significant number of reports and the Incident Response colleagues would be keen to hear of further examples if you could share them. Contact us at [email protected] or call +44 (0)330 822 0321.

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Report shows “improvement” in levels of antisemitic material in Saudi textbooks, but “a few examples of antisemitism remain”

Education authorities in Saudi Arabia have begun to remove antisemitic material from school textbooks.

The research group, IMPACT-se, has been tracking the progress of this project and the report they have produced has reached mixed conclusions.

The report says that there is “a continuing overall trend of improvement” in what Saudi children will learn about Jews in the present. This includes the removal of references to Jews being “disobedient” and Qur’anic verses about Jews being turned into monkeys, as well as the repetition of the idea that one of the goals of Zionism is to bring about a “global Jewish government”.

Also removed were lessons that involved students writing down attempts by “the Jews” to destroy the Al-Aqsa Mosque and Jerusalem, and denials of the Jewish connection to the Temple Mount.

However, the report notes that “a few examples of antisemitism remain. Jews and Christians in pre-Islamic times are presented as wrongdoers. Israel remains omitted from maps; and Zionism still described as racist”.

With antisemitism increasing worldwide, Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on antisemitic incidents globally.

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Teachers from United Nations Relief and Works Agency make inflammatory comments about Jews despite public commitment not to

According to a report by a non-government organisation (NGO), teachers working with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) have continued to publish posts on social media containing inflammatory remarks about Jews, despite making a commitment not to do so.

One prominent example is Hana’a Daoud, a teacher based in Jordan, who wrote a post which quoted an inflammatory passage from the Koran quoted in the Hamas Charter, which says: “‘The Last Hour will not come until the Muslims fight against the Jews, until a Jew will hide himself behind a stone or a tree, and the stone or the tree will say: O Muslim, there is a Jew behind me. Come and kill him’. This is what Allah has promised us, and victory is ours, and Jerusalem is ours, and Gaza is ours.”

Another example is the computer teacher, Nihaya Awad, who at one point posted an image of an armed member of the genocidal antisemitic terror group, Hamas, standing next to a child. This was accompanied by a text praising Hamas, which said: “We testify by Allah that you have demonstrated your faithfulness…and conveyed the message…and have won for your Al-Aqsa…and have broken your enemy’s nose…and have rekindled hope in your faith…may Allah accept your obedience…and raise your matter.”

The Director of the NGO, United Nations Watch, the UN watchdog that authored the report, said: “Around the world, educators who incite hate and violence are removed. Yet UNRWA, despite proclaiming ‘zero tolerance’ for incitement, systematically employs preachers of anti-Jewish hate and terrorism. We call on the governments that fund UNRWA, as they gather at the United Nations to announce new pledges, to declare that they will stop enabling a system that teaches new generations of Palestinians to hate and murder Jews.”

With antisemitism increasing worldwide, Campaign Against Antisemitism reports on antisemitic incidents globally.

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Jewish father sues exclusive Los Angeles school for anti-Jewish discrimination

The Jewish father of a student at the exclusive Brentwood School in West Los Angeles has filed a lawsuit against the school, which his daughter attends, for promoting discrimination against Jews in the name of diversity, equity and inclusion.

Jerome Eisenberg filed the complaint claiming breach of contract, violation of the state of California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act which prevents businesses from discrimination based on religion as well as other factors, and for intentionally inflicting emotional distress.

Mr Eisenberg’s complaint includes the allegation that the school’s Office of Equity and Inclusion prevented Jewish parents from creating a Jewish affinity group between parents and students, something which was available to all other minority groups.

Mr Eisenberg alleges that his daughter was asked not to return to the school to begin the ninth grade after he had raised his concerns about this and other issues.

In response, the Brentwood School released a statement which said that “The allegations contained in the complaint are baseless, a work of whole fiction and nothing more than a desperate attempt to embarrass the school.”

It is estimated that about 40 percent of the school’s student population is Jewish, while 49 percent of the pupils from kindergarten to twelfth grade are students of colour, according to its website.

Image: Google

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Southampton primary school faces backlash after dropping Judaism from Religious Education curriculum

Members of the Jewish community have expressed concern after it was revealed that a primary school in Southampton presented a Religious Education syllabus that does not include Judaism.

Foundry Lane Primary School presented its new syllabus at the Standing Advisory Council for Religious Education (SACRE) meeting at Southampton City Council. It does not include Judaism as a “core” subject, but will cover some Jewish traditions and festivals, including Shabbat, Sukkot, Hanukkah, and Passover.

A representative of the school justified the decision in a statement, saying: “We do not have any Jewish students or teachers in our school. We have a focus on teaching Islam to try to combat the rise of Islamophobia.”

Some members of the Jewish community, however, have expressed about the omission, explaining that it is precisely because there are no Jews in the school community that it is important to teach Judaism, because if children never encounter any Jews and are not taught about Jewish faith and practice, they may develop inaccurate or false ideas which may affect them later in life.

Campaign Against Antisemitism works to raise awareness of antisemitism among all faith and minority communities.

Image credit: Google

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Melbourne school sued over alleged ‘normalising’ of antisemitism

A Melbourne school is being sued by former pupils for allegedly “normalising” antisemitism.

Five former pupils of Brighton Secondary College are suing the school, alleging they were subjected to years of antisemitic bullying, discrimination and negligence. They allege that the principal, Richard Minack, gave speeches endorsing Nazis, called Jewish people sub-human and failed to protect his students from racial discrimination.

According to the students’ barrister, Andrew Butt, four out of the five left the school mid-way through a school year due to the “intolerable” and “hostile” school environment. “We’re talking here about a normalised culture of antisemitism,” Mr Butt stated.

Teachers Paul Varney and Demi Flessa are also named in the lawsuit. The state of Victoria is also being sued for allegedly “condoning” the behaviour. The school, the state of Victoria and all other respondents deny all the allegations.

The students – Joel Kaplan, Liam Arnold-Levy and three minors who cannot be named – allege that they experienced physical and verbal bullying by students and teachers between 2013 and 2020. They claim that the school was “littered” with swastika graffiti drawn on students’ hands and on desks and that they were also subjected to Nazi salutes.

Two of the students allege they were held at knifepoint or assaulted by fellow students, who were not punished.

Mr Minack is alleged to have given speeches referencing his father and grandfather, who had connections to the Nazis during WWII. According to Mr Butt, Mr Minack allegedly “endorsed his Nazi father as a ‘good man’ and at least once referred to Jews as ‘sub-human’ and ‘evil’.”

Former pupil Mr Arnold-Levy, now 21, told the court that, when approaching his Bar Mitzvah, he had decided to wear a kippah to school to show that he was proud of his Jewish heritage. He claimed that within the first hour of walking into his class “it was like target practice.” He claimed that fellow students tore the kippah from his head and threw it in the bin; he had coins thrown at him and was called names including “dirty Jew” and “vermin”; and his locker was defaced with “Heil Hitler.” He told the court that “the harassment happened every day.” Feeling frightened and distraught, Mr Arnold-Levy said that he complained several times to the school’s administration office.

He told the court: “They wrote down what I told them and said they’d give it to the principal” but “nothing ever happened.”

Other allegations include a student being told to remove his Star of David necklace and students not being allowed to complete a project on a former Israeli Prime Minister.

Mr Butt said the school’s failure to protect the students contravened Australia’ Religious Discrimination Act and violated the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Children. “They didn’t feel like they could be openly Jewish at the school,” Mr Butt said.

A recent report into antisemitic bullying at the school discovered an extensive list of alleged incidences of bullying “that spanned years”. Legal representatives of the parents of the young victims expressed regret that the report failed to hold the current leadership of the school to account.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project. 

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Ontario schools asked to axe Agatha Christie book from syllabus over alleged antisemitic references

A leading Ontario school board has asked teachers to remove one of Agatha Christie’s best-known books from its syllabus because of alleged antisemitic references.

The Upper Canada District School Board (UCDSB) has asked teachers to stop requiring pupils to read Christie’s And Then There Were None. 

In a press statement, a UCDSB spokesperson pointed out that the best-selling crime novel was no longer “relevant or engaging.”

The spokesperson added that the book was removed from a summer-school course last July after offensive content was pointed out. This includes a reference to a character named “Mr. Morris” who is referred to in the book as “little Jew” and “Jew-boy” and as having “thick, Semitic lips.” 

Its removal from curricula was to ensure that texts used in schools were not discriminatory, the spokesperson noted. 

The book’s original British title featured an anti-black slur using the N-word. It was first published under that title in 1939. In North America it was published in 1940 under the title And Then There Were None. At different times, it has been titled Ten Little Indians, as well as being sold in the UK with its racially offensive title until 1985, when it was universally retitled as And Then There Were None.

It is the highest-selling crime novel in histor,y having sold more than 100 million copies, and Christie is one of the best-selling writers of all time. However, she has been criticised for xenophobia and anti-Jewish racism that includes her use of antisemitic tropes in several of her books.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project. 

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CAA and CoE’s Diocese of Manchester launch our Love Thy Neighbour teachers’ guides, as featured on BBC Teach

Campaign Against Antisemitism, together with the Church of England’s Diocese of Manchester, launched our Love Thy Neighbour teachers’ guides, which are featured on BBC Teach.

The launch of the free resource yesterday at Canon Slade School in Bolton was hosted by the school’s Rachel Braithwaite, and was attended by local teachers as well as Terry Hart, the Adviser for Religious Education and Christian Distinctiveness for the Diocese Of Manchester; Revd. Canon Steve Williams, the Chair of the Council of Christians and Jews and the Bishop of Manchester’s Interfaith Adviser; Russell Conn, the President of the Jewish Representative Council of Greater Manchester and Region; and David Arnold, a former President of the Council and Holocaust educator.

The guides deal with antisemitism, providing historical background, a useful introduction to the Holocaust and also addressing newer manifestations of anti-Jewish racism that children and adolescents are likely to encounter online, as well as discussing prejudice and hatred more generally.

This free KS2/KS3 resource is designed to enable teachers to plan lessons and assemblies on the topic with ease, with versions of the guide specifically tailored to Church of England schools, Roman Catholic schools and non-denominational schools, while fulfilling numerous required learning objectives in the national curriculum.

You can download the guides here or visit BBC Teach here

Judith Hayman, Outreach Presenter at Campaign Against Antisemitism, said: “For years I have visited schools, talking about Judaism, the Holocaust and antisemitism, and about race hatred and prejudice more generally, and have spoken to about 30,000 school pupils. But there is only one of me, and there are over 40,000 schools in England and Wales. Through CAA and with the help of my friend Canon Steve Williams, we are now able to bring this critical topic to thousands of pupils, taught by their own teachers. With a record rise in antisemitic incidents right now, these lessons are more urgent than ever.”

Binyomin Gilbert, Programme Manager at Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “Centuries after the blood libel, Jewish people are still more than four times likelier to be the targets of hate crime than any other faith group in England. To tackle antisemitism, it is not enough to be reactive; we have to be proactive in our education and our cross-communal relations. Jewish educators cannot conquer this problem alone, which is why we have created these extraordinary teachers’ guides, to empower teachers to play this vital role.”

The guides have received considerable praise:

Revd Canon Steve Williams, the Bishop of Manchester’s Interfaith Adviser, said: “With effective illustrations, and well-researched stories, this material offers memorable encounters that will open minds, change perceptions and help the pupils to identify and tackle discrimination and prejudice today – as well as spotting the deadly seeds of what these develop into.”

Anita Peleg, the Chair of Trustees, Generation 2 Generation Holocaust Education Charity, said: “Love thy Neighbour is an extremely useful guide to antisemitism, I am sure it will be helpful not only to History and R.E. teachers when teaching about the Holocaust but also for those involved in Citizenship education and promoting the need for empathy and understanding of others.”

Alastair Ross, A Religious Education adviser in Tameside, said: “Classroom resources are very welcome and help to provide information and examples that support teachers in delivering challenging and accurate lessons. This is a sensitive area and good factual understanding is a key foundation.”

Paul Bastin, a Year 5 Teacher, said: “This high quality, contemporary, fact heavy resource is the ideal way to introduce and/or consolidate learning on this highly emotive subject.”

Revd Nathan Eddy, the Interim Director of the Council of Christians and Jews, said: “Antisemitism is on the rise, and it is changing in truly alarming ways. This resource features a range of voices, Christian, Jewish and other faiths, and is an excellent tool to combat this prejudice — and others. Highly recommended.”

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High school baseball players taunted with antisemitic slurs during away game

School administrators and local law enforcement in Franklin, Massachusetts, are investigating antisemitic slurs allegedly hurled during a high school baseball game.

On 5th May, the team from Sharon High School travelled to Franklin High School, about fifteen miles away and 42 miles south west of Boston, only to be greeted by fans from the home side shouting antisemitic, racist and homophobic slurs at them.

It has been reported that counselling services are being offered to the victims.

Joe Scozzaro, the Principal of Sharon High, said “Our baseball players reported to their coach after the game that Franklin High spectators were out at the left-field fence heckling our outfielders during the game using antisemitic, racist and homophobic epithets, including various vulgarities.”

In a letter sent out to families, the Franklin High Principal, Joshua Hanna, wrote “We denounce such behaviour and are outraged. Our hearts go out to the Sharon community. There’s no place for such behaviour in our schools and at school events. This behaviour is highly inconsistent with our core values in the inclusive culture we are committed to creating at Franklin High School.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Swastika and pro-Nazi tags found on wall at Paris kindergarten

A swastika and antisemitic tags were discovered on the walls of a kindergarten in the Paris suburb of Courbevoie.

The city of Paris filed a formal police complaint following the spray-painting of the Nazi symbol and message supporting Nazism on the walls of the La Marelle nursery school.

In a tweet, Aurélie Taquillain, Municipal Councillor and Regional Councillor for Ile-de-France, said that she was “shocked” by the symbol and pro-Nazi tags and “strongly condemned” the incident.

She continued: “The values of the Republic are stronger than all these stains and provocations,” adding that “together in Courbevoie as everywhere in France” we will remain “mobilised” against hate.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project. 

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Antisemitic graffiti under investigation at elementary school

School staff discovered two swastikas painted on a utility room at Landels Elementary School, Mountain View on 11th April.

Police said that they were not able to find any footage to help them in their investigation and have therefore issued a press release to seek the community’s help in finding the perpetrator.

This incident comes after graffiti that included the N-word was found at Amy Imai Elementary School. Similarly, graffiti has been discovered at both Bubb and Monta Loma elementary schools, including swastikas.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Five Jewish pupils sue Australian school over alleged antisemitic culture

Five former pupils are suing Brighton Secondary College in Victoria, Australia, reportedly accusing it of tolerating an antisemitic culture.

News reports in 2020 about allegations of antisemitism at the school were followed by the launch of an investigation by the Victorian Department of Education. The 124-page resulting report included eighteen recommendations to improve the reporting and the monitoring policies at the school, and other mechanisms to deal with racist and antisemitic behaviour.

Now, five former pupils are suing the school, reportedly alleging that it tolerated an antisemitic culture that “robbed them of their right to be educated in safety”. Twenty other students are involved in the legal action as well.

One pupil described the school as a “prison culture” and how reporting bullying to staff would only increase its severity. Knife assault is among the incidents that the boy claims to have faced.

The pupils also claim that they were discriminated against by the school’s administration. One student alleges that he was criticised by a teacher because he had “started growing facial hair in accordance with Jewish tradition and law”. The boys claimed that the school’s efforts to address antisemitism were poor, including one class where the Holocaust graphic novel Maus was taught, and teachers were unable to stop laughter and Jewish pupils being called “rats”.

The school has denied legal liability but has reportedly admitted that there were some acts of antisemitism. However, the school has claimed that “the antisemitic acts were small in number and done by a small number of students”. The school also rejected the accusation that it tolerated swastika graffiti.

The case comes as the Jewish Community Council of Victory launches a professional learning programme and a bystander training programme at Brighton Secondary College to give teachers training for how to deal with Antisemitism.

A case against the State of Victoria was launched last year.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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European Union halts aid to Palestinian Authority over antisemitism in school textbooks

The European Union has reportedly put a stop to €214million of annual aid to the Palestinian Authority (PA) following concerns about antisemitic materials in PA textbooks.

Oliver Varhelyi, Hungary’s EU Commissioner for Neighbourhood and Enlargement, suggested that any aid received by the PA come on the condition that “antisemitism and incitement” are removed from educational material used by PA schools. Mr Varhelyi has a record of concern on this issue.

It has been reported that the blocking of the funds was spurred by the publication of a 200-page report by the Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research in 2021, which cited numerous examples of exhortation to violence against, and demonisation of, Jews and Israelis.

One religious studies textbook reportedly requires students to inquire into “repeated attempts by the Jews to kill the prophet [Muhammad].” Another textbook makes a connection between Safiyya bint Abd al-Muttalib, aunt and companion of the Prophet Muhammad – who, according to both Quranic and biographical sources, beat a Jew to death with a club during the Battle of the Trench in 627AD – to a question about how relentlessly brave women are when confronted with “Jewish Zionistic occupation.” Beirut-born Dalal Mughrabi, who belonged to the Fatah faction of the PLO, also features in these teaching materials. Ms Mughrabi was involved in the 1978 Coastal Road massacre in which she and her associates murdered 38 Israelis, including thirteen children, before being killed by security forces. PA textbooks often refer to her as a feminist icon. Similar examples of incitement are reportedly evident across the curriculum, including in science and mathematics books as well as humanities texts.

The European Parliament has previously raised concerns about antisemitic incitement in PA textbooks as well.

Haaretz reports that the issue is now in the hands of the European Commission, which will make a decision on the future of the funding, since  neither Mr Varhelyi’s initial proposal passed nor could a the fourteen-country majority be mustered to overrule.

In 2020, Norway cut its funding to the PA over similar concerns, and the UK has done so as well, reportedly for other reasons.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Denmark develops antisemitism action plan for schools

Denmark has become the latest country to develop an official action plan to tackle antisemitism for students in schools.

In a statement published by Eurydice, the European Union’s network for Europe-wide analysis and information about education systems and policies, Danish policymakers state that they have advanced fifteen initiatives to improve young people’s understanding and knowledge of the Holocaust and antisemitism.

Of the initiatives about antisemitism research and prevention, protection of Jews and Jewish institutions, information for how to deal with antisemitic incidents, and issues surrounding foreign policy, the Eurydice statement specifies five: compulsory education about the Holocaust at all levels of the Danish education system, from primary to secondary school pupils; expanding efforts towards Holocaust remembrance; ensuring teachers understand the harms caused by ostracising pupils based on their background; broadening interreligious dialogue between young people; and providing students with more information about the life and culture of Danish Jews.

These initiatives aim to let pupils know how to fight antisemitism within a broader framework based on mutual tolerance and recognising how what they say and do may well have negative consequences for others. They also encourage educational institutions to make sure that students acquire the knowledge and skills to fight antisemitic myths and conspiracy theories.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Authorities investigating graffiti at Massachusetts school

Authorities are investigating antisemitic and racist graffiti found at a school in Massachusetts.

The graffiti was found on bathroom walls at Natick High School on 8th March.

Anna Nolin, the Natick School District Superintendent, wrote in an email that “Natick Public Schools and the Natick Police Department do not stand for this type of behaviour. This behaviour is inappropriate, not aligned with our core values, and will not be tolerated. We will hold students or others involved fully accountable.”

This incident happened only a few weeks after “social justice training” was held for Natick School District personnel.

The discovery comes just a month after antisemitic, racist and anti-gay graffiti was discovered in a girls’ bathroom at Holten Richmond Middle School in nearby Danvers.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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American School in London reportedly downgraded by Ofsted after controversy over diversity education and staff meeting that sparked antisemitism allegations

The American School in London has reportedly been downgraded by Ofsted, the schools regulator, after a recent controversy over diversity education and a staff meeting that sparked antisemitism allegations.

The report, seen by the JC, apparently observes that pupils at Britain’s most expensive school “spend much time repeatedly considering identity (including analysing their own characteristics) rather than learning, for example, geographical knowledge,” and that older pupils at the St John’s Wood school felt “underprepared” because “the middle-school humanities curriculum…leads to a focus on social issues rather than subject knowledge and skills.”

The headteacher of the school – which counts several famous alumni and children of numerous celebrities – resigned at the end of last year, well short of the end of her ten-year term, after complaints were made by parents about the content of diversity education at the school, both to the media and directly to Campaign Against Antisemitism.

Concerns centred around the teaching of “critical race theory” and other controversial ideas, including “white privilege”. Campaign Against Antisemitism received concerning reports about the school apparently teaching that Jews are part of a privileged elite. A “Privilege Power” chart was reportedly disseminated, which appeared to show Jews just below Protestants and Catholics at the upper end of the “Spirituality-Religion” segment of the chart.

The introduction of racially-segregated after-school clubs reportedly upset numerous parents, many of whom are American.

In addition, allegations arose about a staff meeting in which the words “Nazi”, “swastika”, “Hitler” and “skinheads” were used by faculty members during what was described as a heated conversation about how some parents have reacted to the diversity curriculum.

The school denied that the inflammatory terms were used to describe parents but did not clarify in what context the terms were used. A spokesperson for the school did concede that remarks made during the meeting “could cause offence to the community,” with numerous Jewish families sending their children to the school.

Concerningly, the school’s statement noted that “There were questions asked about whether the response to racism is always as strong and immediate as the response to antisemitism.” This suggestion by one teacher, apparently in connection with parents, caused offence among colleagues, who passed on their concerns to parents and trustees.

Although the headteacher has resigned, concerns remain that the culture and curriculum are the product of wider thinking among senior staff.

Do you or your friends/family have stories of schoolteachers or pupils facing antisemitism at schools in the UK? Contact us at [email protected] or call +44 (0)330 822 0321.

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Police investigating antisemitic graffiti found on Greater Toronto school that used to serve as synagogue

Antisemitic graffiti has been found on a building in Markham, Greater Toronto that is currently being used as a private school but formerly served as a synagogue.

Police are investigating the acts of vandalism which they believe were carried out on separate dates spanning the last two months. 

Reports say that on 9th January, black spray paint was found on signs at Simonston Park, on 12th January, blue spray paint was found on a private school that is understood to be Metro International Secondary Academy, a building that formerly served a synagogue, located across the street on Simonston Boulevard, and on 19th February, blue spray paint was found, again, on the same school building.

York Regional Police said: “Investigators believe that these incidents are hate motivated and are asking any witnesses, anyone with information or video surveillance footage in that area, to please come forward.” 

This latest report comes days after the news that antisemitic graffiti was reportedly found in four Toronto schools amid reports of students in the area performing Nazi salutes.

Constable Alex Li of the Toronto Police Service said: “These are being treated as hate-motivated and our Hate Crime Unit is fully engaged…Due to the similarities in each incident, investigators are exploring whether they are linked.”

The schools involved were Central Technical High School, Rosedale Heights School of the Arts and Malvern Collegiate Institute. Antisemitic graffiti was also reportedly found on the playground of Regal Road Junior Public School.

The reports of graffiti are the latest in what appears to be a spate of antisemitic incidents being carried out among Toronto schools.

On 1st February, two students at North York’s Charles H. Best Middle School reportedly displayed swastikas and gave a Nazi salute in front of classmates in an incident that Principal Elever Baker described as “upsetting and unacceptable.”

On 17th February, two students at Valley Park Middle School reportedly performed the Nazi salute to their classmates, while a third shouted “Heil Hitler” from his desk, all in the presence of their Jewish teacher. 

On 24th February, two twelve-year-old students at Pleasant Public School in the North York area of Toronto reportedly performed the Nazi salute when students were asked to raise their hands for a question.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Woman’s alleged repeated taunting of Jewish schoolgirls with dog reportedly leads to injury in Stamford Hill

A woman’s alleged repeated taunting of Jewish schoolgirls with her dog has reportedly led to an injury.

It was reported that the woman routinely and intentionally scares the schoolgirls with her dog when the children leave the school at the end of the day, recently prompting one girl to run away and injure her foot in the process. It is understood that, rather than taking the dog for a walk, the woman travels by bus to the school, alights, approaches the children, gives the dog more slack on the leash so that it can get closer to the children, and, after terrorising them, she returns to the bus and goes home. This has reportedly occurred on multiple occasions.

This latest incident occurred on Amhurst Park and was reported today by Stamford Hill Shomrim, the Jewish volunteer neighbourhood watch patrol.

If you have any more information, please contact the police on 101 or Stamford Hill Shomrim on 0300 999 0123, quoting reference number: 4605853/22

Campaign Against Antisemitism’s analysis of Home Office statistics shows that an average of over three hate crimes are directed at Jews every single day in England and Wales, with Jews more than four times likelier to be targets of hate crimes than any other faith group.

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Third incident of students performing Nazi salutes in Toronto school reported this month

A third incident of students performing a Nazi salute in a Toronto school this month has been reported.

On Thursday, two twelve-year-old students at Pleasant Public School in the North York area of Toronto reportedly performed the Nazi salute when students were asked to raise their hands for a question.

In a letter sent to parents on Friday, Principal Brian Fong said: “Yesterday, during a class discussion, students were asked to raise their hands in response to a question. Two students kept their hands up for a longer period of time, which was seen by the teacher as a ‘Nazi salute’.”

Principal Fong added that a session on Holocaust education for the Grade 6 class is being prepared. “As a result of what has occurred, we believe it’s important for students to be able to understand the impact of hate symbols and will be working to incorporate this as a learning opportunity to underscore our commitment to create a safe and respectful environment at our school.”

The educator in the classroom at the time said that the students “knew exactly what they were doing,” adding: “I felt attacked. They kept their hands up for a long time. It was blatant and so obvious.”

Last week, we reported that the Toronto District School Board had been urged to address a “wave of antisemitism” after Valley Park Middle School, also in North York, sent a letter to parents informing them that antisemitic graffiti had been discovered and that students had performed the Nazi salute in class.

Reportedly, two students had performed the Nazi salute to their classmates, while a third shouted “Heil Hitler” from his desk, all in the presence of their Jewish teacher. 

A few weeks prior, two students at North York’s Charles H. Best Middle School displayed swastikas and gave a Nazi salute in front of classmates in an incident that Principal Elever Baker described as “upsetting and unacceptable.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Toronto District School Board urged to address “wave of antisemitism” after students perform Nazi salute in front of Jewish teacher

After another report of students performing Nazi salutes in a Toronto school within weeks of a similar incident, the Toronto District School Board (TDSB) has been urged to address a “wave of antisemitism”.

On Thursday, Valley Park Middle School in North York sent a letter to parents informing them that antisemitic graffiti had been discovered and that students had performed the Nazi salute in class.

Reportedly, two students had performed the Nazi salute to their classmates, while a third shouted “Heil Hitler” from his desk, all in the presence of their Jewish teacher. 

The Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center spoke to the teacher of the Grade 8 class, a Jewish woman and daughter of Holocaust survivors who was said to be “very hurt, very upset, very traumatised” by the event.

Valley Park Middle School Principal George Bartzis said that the incident was “upsetting and unacceptable,” adding: “We take great pride in our school as a welcoming, safe, and inclusive place and this has always been our message to students. It is also not reflective of who we are and what we stand for as a school and as a community.”

The incident was also condemned by the Mayor of Toronto, John Tory, who said that it was “as sad as it is hurtful and obviously unacceptable. It is extremely troubling to see antisemitic acts, especially among young people, happening in our community.”

This latest incident comes only weeks after the news that two students at Charles H. Best Middle School, also located in the North York area, displayed swastikas and gave a Nazi salute in front of classmates.

Shari Schwartz-Maltz, a spokesperson for the TDSB and Chair of the School Board’s Jewish Heritage Committee, said that the students responsible would ​​​​ face “consequences” and that the Board would be taking on a more proactive approach in tackling antisemitism. 

The Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center said that the school board was witnessing a “wave of antisemitism” that was “unprecedented in terms of both number of incidents and their escalating gravity.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Nazi concentration camps recreated in popular children’s online game 

A popular children’s online game drew attention recently after it was discovered that some of its users had recreated Nazi concentration camps.

Roblox is a computer game where users can create, and interact with, virtual worlds. It has been discovered that users were able to interact with a virtual Nazi concentration camp where they were able to click “execute” to then release deadly gas from showerheads.

There was also reportedly a railroad built in order to simulate the entrance to Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.

Tanya Carter, of the Safe Schools Alliance campaign group, a grassroots organisation that campaigns to uphold child safeguarding in schools, said: “We are horrified to hear of Nazi rooms featuring dead bodies and gas chambers…This is particularly disturbing in a climate of rising antisemitism.”

In a statement, Roblox said: “We have zero tolerance for content or behaviours that promote or glorify extremism, including antisemitism.

“We have removed the experiences in question and permanently banned the individuals who created them from our platform. We work tirelessly to maintain a platform that is safe, civil and inclusive, and we use a combination of manual and automated detection tools to swiftly remove experiences that do not comply with our Community Standards.

“We are committed to preventing this type of content from being uploaded to our platform, remove it as soon as we learn about it, and take appropriate steps against those who have uploaded the content.

“In tandem with our efforts, we encourage anyone to report content or behaviour that may promote extremism using our Report Abuse feature, and we have a dedicated team of thousands who act on those reports.”

It was also reported in September that Roblox, in addition to other online games including Call of Duty and Minecraft, was being used as a means of spreading antisemitism. 

Roblox spokespeople condemned the news at the time, stating: “We work relentlessly to ensure our platform remains a safe and civil space, and with a combination of machine learning and a team of over 2,000 moderators, we monitor for safety 24-7 to detect and swiftly act on any inappropriate content or behaviour.”

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Jewish family in Alabama receives death threats after reporting teacher’s Nazi salutes

A family in Birmingham, Alabama has received both death and arson threats after reporting an incident in which their teenage son witnessed his teacher leading the class in giving Nazi-style salutes during a history lesson.

Mariya Tytell, the mother of Ephraim “Epps” Tytell, who attends Mountain Brook High School in the Birmingham suburb of Mountain Brook, described the incident as part of “a pattern” of antisemitism.

Her son “came home very upset,” she said, adding that he told her and his father that students were performing the Nazi salute. As the only Jewish student in the history class, it had made him feel “very scared and uncomfortable,” he had told them.

Ms Tytell admits that she initially thought that it had been “a misunderstanding” and brushed off her son’s concerns, but she then received calls from other parents and realised that this had not been the case.

A statement from the regional education authority said that the lesson was to explain about symbols changing over time and that the teacher allegedly “using the Bellamy salute” as an example. Before its adoption by the Nazis, this was a gesture to show allegiance to the American flag. School leaders said that the teacher had not instructed students to give the salute.

A short video, taken by a classmate, showing students raising their arms toward the American flag was circulated on social media. Ms Tytell said that an administrator told her son to apologise for sharing the video, and that when her son refused, he allegedly faced retaliation from his teacher including having his phone taken away and having his seat moved to the front of the classroom.

Ms Tytell said that the family tried to work out the issue with the school’s administration but claims that they were brushed off and that after speaking to the media about the incident, the family received death and arson threats.

“We kind of see it as a failure of leadership and also as part of a longer pattern of constant antisemitic incidents,” said Ms Tytell.

Danny Cohn, CEO of the Birmingham Jewish Federation and acting CEO of the Alabama Holocaust Education Centre, said that he did not think the teacher was “being intentionally antisemitic.”

Mr Cohn said that the reason for the incident could be attributed to a lapse in judgment, but added that he understood the reaction that it had provoked. When Jews “see the Nazi salute, they’re not listening for context,” he said. “They just see something that’s sent more than six million of our people to their deaths.”

He said that he had asked Mountain Brook Schools to allow its teachers to participate in a Holocaust education programme.

Mountain Brook school district leaders later conceded that the history lesson had lacked sensitivity. They also reportedly said that they did not condone performing the salute when a picture would have been sufficient and that the issue had been addressed with the teacher. They added that they stand against antisemitism and that they were working with local Jewish organisations.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project. 

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German politician rebukes education officials over failure to remove antisemitic stereotypes from textbooks

A German politician has condemned education officials for failing to remove antisemitic stereotypes from school textbooks.

Jonas Weber of the Social Democrat Party (SPD) in Baden-Württemberg said that disturbing portrayals of Jewish people could still be found in the State’s educational resources, stating: “Unfortunately, we have the impression the Ministry of Education does not want to set the necessary priorities in the fight against antisemitic stereotypes in textbooks.”

It was said that some of Mr Weber’s primary concerns lie with medieval and Renaissance period texts and cites examples such as Martin Luther’s “Against the Jews And Their Lies” from 1543, a seventeenth-century Spanish Catholic text, as well as enlightenment thinkers including Voltaire, Feuerbach, Marx and Schopenhauer.

Dr. Michael Blume, the first antisemitism commissioner for the State of Baden-Württemberg, asked for the creation of a committee “to make textbook approval in Baden-Württemberg more transparent”, prompting the State’s Ministry of Education to analyse a sample of textbooks for examples of antisemitism, with the assistance of the Central Council of Jews and Baden-Württemberg’s Centre for School Quality and Teacher Training (ZSL).

However, Michael Kilper, Head of the Department for General Education schools, said: “The representations of Judaism are predominantly technically correct and appropriately differentiated.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project. 

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Police in Massachusetts investigate antisemitism at girls’ school

Police are investigating what’s being described as racist, homophobic and antisemitic graffiti found in a girls’ bathroom at a Massachusetts middle school.

According to The Salem News,  the graffiti was found at the Holten Richmond Middle School in Danvers, according to an e-mail sent to parents by Acting Co-Superintendents Keith Taverna and Mary Wermers.

They wrote that “the Danvers Public Schools condemns this type of behaviour and will continue to educate our students on hate speech,” adding that the district was “committed to building an inclusive community where everyone belongs.”

Town Manager Steve Bartha said that the graffiti included several profane words and a symbol.

The small Massachusetts town has previously come under scrutiny over alleged racism and homophobia on the high school hockey team, and the Town Manager, Police Chief and the town’s Human Rights and Inclusion Committee are reportedly planning to make a database of incident available to the public.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Toronto schools regret incidents involving swastika and Holocaust trivialisation

A school in the Toronto area is investigating an incident in which two students displayed swastikas and gave a Nazi salute in front of classmates.

In a letter to parents of pupils at Charles H. Best Middle School in North York, principal Elever Baker described the incident as “upsetting and unacceptable.”

He said that the school “acknowledges and regrets” the “harm this incident caused to members of our school community and to our shared school climate.”

Mr Baker said that the school took “great pride” in being “a welcoming, safe, and inclusive place,” adding that it was “not reflective of who we are and what we stand for as a school and as a community.”

The school was taking “immediate steps to address the issue,” and an investigation “remains ongoing” Mr Baker said. “We are committed to the work of intentionally identifying, interrupting, and addressing racism and discrimination…with a focus on antisemitism,” his letter stated.

Staff members were consulting with Toronto District School Board (TDSB) equity advisers to establish new strategies and tools for addressing antisemitism, he said.

Shari Schwartz-Maltz, a spokesperson for the TDSB and Chair of the School Board’s Jewish Heritage Committee, said that the students who displayed the swastika probably did not understand what it meant. It was “a symbol they see on TV, they’ve seen unfurled on flags at demonstrations” and which they see online. “It becomes normalised and they don’t know what it really means. What it means is a symbol of hate,” she said. 

In a statement on Twitter, Mayor John Tory said that he was “very saddened” to hear of the incident, adding that it “demonstrates how much work we still have in front of us to inform and educate as part of our effort to eradicate antisemitism in all of its forms.”

In a separate incident, a teacher at another school in North York has been removed from the classroom after likening COVID-19 vaccine mandates to the yellow Star of David that Jews were forced to wear during the Holocaust.

The Acting Principal of Ledbury Park Elementary and Middle School wrote to parents to inform them about an “antisemitic incident”. Serge Parravano wrote that the teacher – who had likened the current COVID-19 vaccine mandates to the forced wearing of the yellow star by Jews in Nazi-occupied Europe – had been “removed from the classroom” and was “on home assignment pending an investigation.”

Mr Parravano said in his letter that the teacher’s comments were “upsetting and unacceptable” and was “not reflective of who we are and what we stand for as a school and a community.”

As part of its response, the school has arranged for Michelle Glied-Goldstein to speak to students. Ms Glied-Goldstein is an educator with the Holocaust education organisation, Carrying Holocaust Testimony from Generation to Generation.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project. 

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‘Merchant of Venice’ cancelled in New York City school amid fears it is “inappropriate”

A New York City school cancelled its production of Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice amid parental concerns about the antisemitic themes in the play.

According to a report in the New York Post, Jewish parents expressed concerns that the play may not be appropriate for the teenage drama students at Morton Middle School in Manhattan. 

The Shakespearean tragedy tells the story of the Jewish moneylender Shylock, depicted as the stereotype of “a greedy Jew”, who is insulted by his Christian enemies. A Smithsonian Magazine analysis has observed that there were more than 50 productions of the play in Nazi Germany between 1933 and 1939, lending “credence to the charge of antisemitism,” according to the magazine.

Theatre for a New Audience (TFNA), the Manhattan-based organisation collaborating with the students on the play, told the New York Post that they had taken into consideration the “polarising elements of the play” when developing the project and had worked with input from the ADL to ensure that the “challenging themes” would be treated with the “proper critical analysis, sensitivity, and thoughtfulness.” 

Nevertheless, the school decided to abandon the production, saying its decision was not taken “lightly,” that they had “worked diligently” with TFNA and had “listened to the members of our community to resolve concerns.”

According to school sources, opinion was divided. One member of the school community said that you needed “knowledge and context” to understand how “bad and dangerous the antisemitism” in this play was. But other parents were “opposed” to scrapping the production, while yet others calling for a dialogue, with one parent noting that, while he had “reservations,” by cancelling the play, the school was missing “a teachable moment.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project. 

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Tennessee Bible class reportedly taught pupils how to “torture a Jew”

The parent of a Jewish student in a Tennessee school has expressed outrage after the teacher in a Bible class allegedly pushed Christian ideology and told students how to “torture a Jew”.

In a Facebook post, Juniper Russo wrote that although the class at East Hamilton Middle School, in Hamilton County, Chattanooga, was meant to teach the Bible from “an unbiased and non-sectarian viewpoint,” the class was, she claimed, used for “blatant Christian proselytising.”

Ms Russo wrote that she had been hesitant to enrol her daughter in the class, run by the Bible in the Schools programme, but had done so as her daughter had disabilities that made other classes inaccessible. 

According to Ms Russo, assignments given to students included questions about whether they read the Bible at home and which books of the Bible they read. She said that students were told about an atheist student who took the class and became a Christian believer and were shown a video which, according to Ms Russo, portrayed Christianity as “light, sunshine and colour” and “all other global religions as storms, darkness and shadows.”

While Ms Russo was already uncomfortable with the teaching, she decided to take her daughter out of the class after, she claimed, it “turned hostile” when the teacher allegedly “wrote an English transliteration of the Hebrew name of God on the whiteboard.” Telling the class that this name was “traditionally not spoken out loud” she allegedly added: “If you want to know how to torture a Jew, make them say this out loud.”

Ms Russo said that her daughter “felt extremely uncomfortable” hearing this comment and that she no longer felt “safe in the class.”

Ms Russo reported that when she tried to arrange a meeting with the teacher, the school administration and the director of the local Jewish Federation, she was told by the principal that her concerns were being taken seriously but that the teacher refused to meet her, claiming that it was against the policy of the Bible in the Schools programme.

Ms Russo also noted that the incident followed the recent ban by nearby McMinn County of Maus, a graphic novel about the Holocaust.

The Bible in the Schools programme has been operating in the area’s public schools since 1922. According to the programme’s website, it allows students to study the Bible from a “literary or historical perspective” and from a “viewpoint-neutral, court-approved curriculum.” It claims to be “inclusive to students from all walks of life.”

A spokesperson for Hamilton County Schools (HSC) said that it was investigating the “parent complaint” concerning the course. When completed, and “in accordance with school board policy,” HCS would “take appropriate steps.”

In a statement, the Jewish Federation of Greater Chattanooga said that it was aware of the issues concerning the Bible class and noted that both the school and HCS were “investigating the claims and taking them seriously.” The group said that it looked forward to “a healthy dialogue with the Bible in the Schools organisation.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Antisemitic graffiti found in elementary school in Marblehead, MA three times in one month

A police investigation is being conducted in Marblehead, near Boston, after antisemitic graffiti was discovered in bathrooms at an elementary school three times in January 2022.

The first two were swastikas, etched into bathroom stools. The third included “profane language targeted at Jewish people”, and was reported on International Holocaust Remembrance Day. The other incidents at the Massachusetts school were reported on 18th January and 26th January.

Superintendent John Buckley wrote an e-mail to the school community, stating: “To say I am disheartened and angry would be an understatement. We have been working with Marblehead Police since the first incident. Destroying school property by scratching swastikas or any other form of hate will be fully investigated by the Marblehead Police Department and any students who engage in such acts face consequences accordingly.”

Around 80 “Team Harmony” students from the high school gave a talk to the elementary school about hate and bias.

Nearby, Curry College in Milton reported five cases of vandalism. These incidents all included hate speech and antisemitic graffiti, such as a swastika.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Tennessee school board bans Pulitzer Prize-winning book about the Holocaust written by the son of a survivor

A Tennessee school board has banned a Pulitzer Prize-winning book about the Holocaust.

Maus: a Survivor’s Tale, a graphic novel that depicts the experiences of the author’s parents during the Holocaust, was reportedly banned owing to “rough, objectionable language” and nudity. 

Tony Allman, a board member on the McMinn County Board of Education, said: “It shows people hanging, it shows them killing kids, why does the educational system promote this kind of stuff? It is not wise or healthy.”

Board minutes show that in response, Instructional Supervisor Julie Goodin countered, “I was a history teacher, and there is nothing pretty about the Holocaust, and, for me, this was a great way to depict a horrific time in history.”

The Board voted to ban the book and replace it with one that it deemed less controversial.

The book’s author, Art Spiegelman, said that the decision had “the breath of autocracy and fascism about it. I think of it as a harbinger of things to come,” and clarified that the Board’s concern with nudity referred to a small image of his mother in the bath after cutting her wrists. “You have to really, like, want to get your sexual kicks by projecting on it,” Mr Spiegelman added.

In response to an online backlash to the news of the ban, the Board said that its members “do not diminish the value of Maus as an impactful and meaningful piece of literature, nor do we dispute the importance of teaching our children the historical and moral lessons and realities of the Holocaust.”

They added: “We all have an obligation to ensure that younger generations learn of its horrors to ensure that such an event is never repeated. We simply do not believe that this work is an appropriate text for our students to study.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project. 

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Mexican teacher dressed as Hitler while another tells her pupils a “What is the difference between a pizza and a Jew?” joke

Two Mexican schools have been rocked by antisemitism controversies in recent days.

In one secondary school, a history teacher allegedly dressed up as Hitler and instructed pupils to perform Nazi salutes. She also allegedly produced a doll of the Nazi leader, according to a pupil. It is understood that Jewish pupils complained to the teacher and school administration but were ignored.

Elsewhere, at Mexico City’s Centre for Higher Studies of San Angel University (CESSA), a teacher joked to her class: “What is the difference between a pizza and a Jew? A pizza doesn’t scream when it’s put into the oven.”

In a recording of the Zoom class, several students can reportedly be seen laughing at Irene García Méndez’s joke. The only pupil to protest was a Jewish pupil, who reportedly said: “Your joke is in too bad taste. Yes, and I’m telling you the truth as a Jew, I find your joke in too bad taste.”

The teacher has been dismissed by CESSA, which said in a statement: “Her offensive statements should be regarded as her personal views and do not reflect our institutional values. We offer an apology to our students, alumni, professors, and collaborators, as well as to the Jewish community and to all the people offended by these out of place comments.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project. 

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Washington DC elementary school instructor forced Jewish child to play Adolf Hitler and “commit suicide” in class reenactment of the Holocaust

On Friday, an elementary school instructor in Washington DC reportedly forced her class to perform a reenactment of the Holocaust, in which she cast a Jewish child to play Adolf Hitler.

The children belong to the third-grade class of Watkins Elementary School, which would make them eight and nine years old. 

According to one parent, her child was made to act like he was on a train headed towards a concentration camp, before being told to pretend as though he was dying in a gas chamber. He was also allegedly told to act as if he were shooting his classmates. 

Principal Scott Berkowitz e-mailed parents at the school in which he detailed the events of the class, which said that the unnamed instructor ordered the class to simulate shooting their classmates and then to dig mass graves. According to the e-mail, the instructor also forced a Jewish child to play Hitler before telling him to pretend to commit suicide, as Hitler did. Following the incident, the entire class met with the school’s mental health response team. 

Principal Berkowitz said: “I want to acknowledge the gravity of this poor instructional decision, as students should never be asked to act out or portray any atrocity, especially genocide, war, or murder.”

Friday’s class in which this took place was supposed to be for the students to work on a self-directed project which they would then present to the class, but the instructor allegedly used this time to instead carry out the Holocaust reenactment. 

The instructor, who is now on leave, pending a school investigation, reportedly made antisemitic comments throughout the reenactment, which included responding to the children’s question as to why the Nazis carried out such atrocities against Germany’s Jewish population by saying that it was “because the Jews ruined Christmas”. The instructor also reportedly asked the students not to tell anyone of the reenactment, though the students informed their homeroom teacher of the incident.

The incident was reported to Washington D.C. Public Schools’ (DCPS) Comprehensive Alternative Resolution and Equity Team. A spokesperson for DCPS said: “This was not an approved lesson plan, and we sincerely apologize to our students and families who were subjected to this incident.”

A spokesperson for Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “The reports of what took place in this class are so shocking as to be unbelievable. Ordering eight- and nine-year-old children to re-enact the Holocaust, including pretending to shoot one another and dig mass graves while their instructor hurls antisemitic insults at them and a Jewish child is made to play Hitler and re-enact the Nazi leader’s suicide, is not merely racist and of no pedagogical value, but is traumatising for the children, professionally derelict for the instructor and potentially abusive. It is right that an investigation takes place, and if the reports are borne out, the instructor must be fired and the school board must open its own inquiry.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has launched a new weekly podcast. New episodes of Podcast Against Antisemitism are available every Thursday and can be streamed here or downloaded wherever you get your podcasts. 

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Jewish students in Australia sue State of Victoria over secondary college reportedly ignoring antisemitic bullying

Jewish students in Australia are suing the State of Victoria over allegations that Brighton Secondary College in Melbourne reportedly ignored claims of antisemitic bullying.

The State, in addition to the principal and two teachers at the college, now face a Federal Court hearing in proceedings for breaching of the Racial Discrimination Act and negligence. The students have accused the college of creating a “prison culture”.

Lawyers for the State and school staff deny the accusations.

The case comes a year after an inquiry was launched into the accusations, the results of which the parents of the students were unhappy with. Jane McCullough, a lawyer representing the students, said at the time: “The families do not believe that the report and its findings go in any way far enough towards combating a significant problem of antisemitism at Brighton Secondary College, nor does it provide an acceptable outcome or justice for them. The families will continue to fight to be heard and for justice for their children.”

The inquiry was launched after an investigative piece was written by The Australian Jewish News, which reportedly unearthed a long list of claims that “that spanned years, with one Jewish student said to have been lured to a park where he was robbed and beaten at night, and another allegedly threatened with a knife in a school bathroom. One boy said he was told to ‘Get in my oven’ and had ‘Heil Hitler’ chanted at him. Countless instances of swastikas were said to be daubed on school walls and property, and allegations of inaction were directed at the principal and coordinators.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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American School in London in turmoil over concerns about diversity education and staff meeting that sparked antisemitism allegations

The prestigious American School in London is in turmoil over concerns about the content of diversity education and after revelations about a staff meeting that sparked antisemitism allegations.

The headteacher of the school – the most expensive day school in Britain, which counts several famous alumni and children of numerous celebrities – has resigned well short of the end of her ten-year term, after complaints were made by parents about the content of diversity education at the school, both to the media and directly to Campaign Against Antisemitism.

Concerns centred around the teaching of “critical race theory” and other controversial ideas, including “white privilege”. Campaign Against Antisemitism has received concerning reports about the school apparently teaching that Jews are part of a privileged elite. A “Privilege Power” chart was reportedly disseminated, which appeared to show Jews just below Protestants and Catholics at the upper end of the “Spirituality-Religion” segment of the chart.

The introduction of racially-segregated after-school clubs reportedly upset numerous parents, many of whom are American.

In addition, allegations have arisen about a staff meeting in which the words “Nazi”, “swastika”, “Hitler” and “skinheads” were used by faculty members during what was described as a heated conversation about how some parents have reacted to the diversity curriculum.

The school has denied that the inflammatory terms were used to describe parents but has not clarified in what context the terms were used. A spokesperson for the school did concede that remarks made during the meeting “could cause offence to the community,” with numerous Jewish families sending their children to the school.

Concerningly, the school’s statement noted that “There were questions asked about whether the response to racism is always as strong and immediate as the response to antisemitism.” This suggestion by one teacher, apparently in connection with parents, caused offence among colleagues, who passed on their concerns to parents and trustees.

Although the headteacher has resigned, concerns remain that the culture and curriculum are the product of wider thinking among senior staff.

A spokesperson for the school said: “Teachers did not refer to parents by any of the words [listed above]. However, [the headteacher] and the school were concerned that the question contrasting the responses to racism and antisemitism could cause offence to members of the community, and this was addressed immediately. We are committed to building and sustaining a diverse, equitable and inclusive school community and firmly believe this will lead to a better future for all our children.”

A spokesperson for Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “We have been receiving disturbing reports about the American School in London. There are claims that terms like ‘Nazis’ were used at a staff meeting. Although the school denies this extreme language referred to Jewish parents, it apparently does not dispute that these terms did appear in their discussion, which allegedly also featured language suggesting that antisemitism and racism are different. The school must tackle this problem suitably forcefully and seriously.”

Do you or your friends/family have stories of schoolteachers or pupils facing antisemitism at schools in the UK? Contact us at [email protected] or call +44 (0)330 822 0321.

Image credit: Google

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Anger after Arizona anti-vaxxer delivers antisemitic diatribe at school meeting and officials do not react

A row has erupted in Arizona following an antisemitic tirade at a school board meeting in a Phoenix suburb.

A speech during the public comment period of a meeting of Chandler District School Board addressed vaccines – a topic at the centre of heated public debate in the United States. The speaker, a woman who identified herself as Melanie Rettler, spoke for over a minute, referring to “the cabal, the swamp,” and “the elite.” After asserting that vaccines “aren’t safe” and “aren’t effective”, she claimed that people were “paying” for them through “the increase” in gas and food prices, with the money “being given to these pharmaceutical companies,” adding that Jews “owned all the pharmaceutical companies.” Concluding her diatribe, she then added: “…and if you want to bring race into this, it’s the Jews.”

The row, however, is as much about the failure of the officials to immediately challenge the woman as to the antisemitic outburst itself.

Board President Barbara Mozdzen merely said that comments needed “to be related to what the school board could do something about.”

However, The board’s interim Superintendent, Franklin Narducci, contacted representatives of the Jewish community after hearing of the speech and was praised by local Jewish leaders for “leading by example” in “speaking out against the hatred.”

In a statement Mr Narducci said that “Chandler Unified School District denounces hate speech at all levels” and reaffirmed its commitment “to use its influence…to teach students the value of an inclusive community.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

Image credit: Nicole Raz/Jewish News of Greater Phoenix

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Texas teachers told to offer “opposing” perspectives about the Holocaust

Teachers in Southlake, Texas were told that if they have a book about the Holocaust, they also need to have one that offers “opposing” perspectives, it was reported yesterday.

Gina Peddy, the Carroll school district’s Executive Director of Curriculum and Instruction, allegedly made the remarks last week, a few days after a fourth-grade teacher received a complaint from a parent for having an anti-racist book. 

In audio from a meeting that was secretly recorded by one of the staff members, Ms Peddy can reportedly be heard telling teachers to “remember the concepts of [House Bill] 3979.” The bill refers to a new Texas law that requires teachers to offer differing views when discussing “widely debated and currently controversial” issues.

Ms Peddy reportedly added: “Make sure that if you have a book on the Holocaust, that you have one that has an opposing…that has other perspectives.”

One woman can be heard replying: “How do you oppose the Holocaust?” “Believe me,” Peddy appeared to respond. “That’s come up.”

Carroll spokesperson Karen Fitzgerald wrote that the school district “recognises that all Texas teachers are in a precarious position with the latest legal requirements,” referring to the new law. “Our purpose is to support our teachers in ensuring they have all of the professional development, resources and materials needed. Our district has not and will not mandate books be removed nor will we mandate that classroom libraries be unavailable.”

Ms Fitzgerald added that teachers who are unsure about a specific book “should visit with their campus principal, campus team and curriculum coordinators about appropriate next steps.”

One Carroll teacher, who kept her identity anonymous, said that “Teachers are literally afraid that we’re going to be punished for having books in our classes. There are no children’s books that show the ‘opposing perspective’ of the Holocaust or the ‘opposing perspective’ of slavery. Are we supposed to get rid of all of the books on those subjects?”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Nazi stickers with razor blades placed underneath found at Kent bus stop near primary school

Nazi stickers with razor blades placed underneath have been found in Kent at a bus stop near a primary school.

The stickers were discovered at the Dunton Green bus stop on 22nd September.

The Vice-Principal of nearby Dartford Technology College wrote to parents to warn them of the stickers, saying: “The school has received a message from Kent County Council regarding an abhorrent incident of vandalism, whereby extremist and racist stickers were attached to a bus stop that was very close to a primary school. The worrying aggravating factor was that razor blades were slipped underneath the stickers, creating an injury risk when removing stickers.”

Sightings of other stickers were reportedly made on 5th September in Chatham and on 8th September on Henry Street. Kent Police said that the stickers in Chatham did not have razor blades behind them. 

Inspector Matt Atkinson from Sevenoaks’ Community Safety Unit said: “This is disturbing behaviour and while I do not want to cause people to panic, I do want to raise awareness of this issue. Publicly promoting offensive, hate-filled notices is not acceptable in itself but adding razor blades to potentially seriously harm somebody is despicable.”

“If anyone has information as to who placed these stickers in this location or sees anything similar of concern please do report it via 101 and do not attempt to remove them,” he added.

In June, a sticker belonging to the neo-Nazi group, British National Socialist Movement, was found on a lamppost near Manchester’s Charedi Jewish community.

Last year, members of the proscribed National Action group were sentenced to prison, having engaged, amongst other activities, in far-right stickering and recruitment campaigns. Campaign Against Antisemitism continues to monitor and report on far-right stickering campaigns.

Image credit: Google

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Sacked Eton teacher shares interview with author who claimed “Jews were always behind pornography”

A former teacher at Eton College has shared an interview he conducted with an author who claimed that “Jews were always behind pornography”.

Will Knowland, who was reportedly sacked from his position as an English teacher at the prestigious school last year after accusations of sexism were raised against him, shared an interview online in which his guest was a controversial author.

During the interview, the topic of which was pornography and its place in society, author Dr E Michael Jones made several inflammatory remarks. At one point, Dr Jones says: “If you’re talking about, concretely, the rise of pornography in the twentieth century, you have to talk about Hollywood, and you have to talk about the Jews. The Jews were always behind pornography.”

Later in the interview, when Mr Knowland quizzed the author on whether pornography could exist as an expression of free speech, Dr Jones reportedly said: “It’s not part of free speech, no one ever said that dirty pictures were part of free speech, but that’s what the Jews did over this period of time.” He allegedly also called the ADL, an American Jewish organisation, “the SS of the Jewish Gestapo”.

According to the ADL, Dr Jones is “an antisemitic Catholic writer who promotes the view that Jews are dedicated to propagating and perpetrating attacks on the Catholic Church and moral standards, social stability, and political order throughout the world”. The group adds that he “portrays the Jewish religion as inherently treacherous and belligerent towards Christianity” and that he “describes Jews as ‘outlaws and subversives [who use] religion as a cover for social revolution,’ and claims that Judaism possesses ‘a particularly malignant spirit’.”

In 2008, Mr Jones defended the use of the terms “the synagogue of Satan” and “the vomit of Judaism”, stressing that they originate from religious sources.

Mr Knowland reportedly defended the interview yesterday, stating that “Clearly many Jews are aghast at pornography, but suppressing discussion is not healthy. Accordingly, Jewish involvement in pornography has been discussed in the Jewish Quarterly. If Dr E Michael Jones is mistaken in his views, giving them a platform is the best way to expose those mistakes.”

Mr Jones has denied all accusations of antisemitism.

Campaign Against Antisemitism continues its robust engagement with social media companies over the content that they enable to be published, and we continue to make representations to the Government in this connection.

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Police investigating after video emerges of schoolchildren shouting antisemitic language and performing Hitler salutes in Catholic school in Ontario

Police are reportedly investigating after a video emerged appearing to show children in a Catholic school shouting antisemitic language and performing Hitler salutes in Ontario.

North Bay police are examining the video, in which pupils at École Secondaire Catholique Algonquin appear to be marching around a field shouting antisemitic language and performing Nazi salutes.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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CAA launches new antisemitism teachers’ guide for non-denominational schools, in addition to existing guides endorsed by BBC Teach

Campaign Against Antisemitism has published a new teachers’ guide on antisemitism for non-denominational schools, to complement our existing guides designed for Church of England and Catholic Schools which have been endorsed by BBC Teach.

The new guide, Love Your Neighbour, is, like the other two guides, intended for use with an accompanying student-friendly PowerPoint presentation, which is also available on our website and through BBC Teach.

Our existing guides – Love Thy Neighbour, designed specifically for Church of England schools, and Love Your Neighbour, for Catholic schools – have also been updated to cover new cultural developments and manifestations of anti-Jewish racism, including with reference to the social media platform TikTok, Black Lives Matter and the antisemitic grime artist Wiley.

These guides, like so many of our projects, represent the hard work of our dedicated expert volunteers, who have poured their wealth of experience in education and teaching antisemitism to young people into these guides.

Binyomin Gilbert, Programme Manager at Campaign Against Antisemitism, said: “We are extremely proud of our teachers’ guides, which, thanks to the efforts of our tireless volunteers, have enabled countless schoolchildren of all ages to learn about antisemitism from their own teachers. These guides provide teachers with accessible resources to teach a complex topic and satisfy important requirements of the national curriculum. Following the success of our guides in the Church of England and Catholic school systems, we are delighted to launch our non-denominational guide for wider use in schools across the country. We continue to pursue innovative ways to discharge our mandate to educate society, including our youth, about the dangers of antisemitism and what they can do to stand up against it.”

You can download the guides here or visit BBC Teach here

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Concerns over Holocaust ignorance amongst teachers, leading to “real-life consequences”

Concerns have been raised over ignorance surrounding the Holocaust amongst teachers in England, including those charged with educating schoolchildren on the subject.

Although researchers from University College London’s (UCL) Centre for Holocaust Education said that there have been improvements since a similar study was conducted in 2009, nevertheless there remain significant causes of concern.

The research found that most teachers did not know where or when the Holocaust began or what proportion of the German population in 1933 was Jewish. Less than half of the teachers surveyed knew what the response of the British Government was to hearing about the genocide of European Jewry, and about a fifth of those with recent experience of teaching about the Holocaust had received no formal specialist training.

The result, according to Dr Andy Pearce of UCL, is that pupils could be developing “skewed and fundamentally erroneous impressions of this period.” He added: “If one of the aims of teaching and learning about the Holocaust is to prevent the repetition of similar atrocities in the future, then we need to have secure knowledge and understanding of why this particular genocide happened. As a society, we should have no tolerance for misunderstandings, myths and mythologies about the Holocaust. That can be a breeding ground for conspiracy theories and for revisionism and for denial and distortion. There are real-world consequences for these misconceptions and misunderstandings.”

The study was based on focus groups and a survey of 1,077 teachers, 964 of whom had recently taught the Holocaust.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has published curricula dealing more broadly with the topic of antisemitism. The curricula can be accessed here.

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Head of UNRWA grilled over alleged antisemitism and incitement to Jihad in textbooks

Philippe Lazzarini, the Head of UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency), was told last week by Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) to take “concrete steps” towards reform following allegations that textbooks used in UNRWA schools contained antisemitism, incitement to Jihad and the rejection of peace-making.

At a hearing of the European Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee (AFET), Mr Lazzarini claimed UNRWA had revised the textbooks following the allegations of antisemitism and other problematic content, revealed by a recent report from educational monitoring organisation IMPACT-se, as reported by CAA.

Mr Lazzarini’s acknowledged that “there are a number of issues needing to be addressed” but this did not satisfy MEPs. Germany’s Dietmar Köster said UNRWA had “admitted” that “its own education directors” had produced educational material between March and November 2020 “branded with UNRWA logo” that “incites to violence, calls for jihad and rejects peace-making.”  

Spanish MEP Jose Ramon Bauza Diaz, said “mentions of terrorism in certain texts” made it “very serious” if European taxpayers’ money was used “to pay for encouragement of terrorism or to foster corruption.”

Slovak MEP Miriam Lexmann, demanded to know “what concrete steps” Mr Lazzarini had taken. “What has been done to collect these materials back from 320,000 students,” she asked. “We know if these books remain with the students, they will create further damage.” Ms Lexmann also recalled that a U.S. State Department report on UNRWA said that UNRWA teachers had “refused to take part in training for tolerance and conflict resolution.”

Dutch MEP Bert-Jan Ruissen said the recent IMPACT-se report showed that “in the new textbooks of UNRWA” there was “daily mention of violence, rejection of peace and denial of the legitimacy of Israel.” Mr Ruissen added: “I think there is a question of how long we can tolerate this.”

The European Union is UNRWA’s largest institutional donor. Earlier this year, it passed a resolution condemning UNRWA and demanding that problematic material be “removed immediately.” In doing so, it became the first legislature to censure UNRWA over alleged teaching of hate and incitement to violence. The European Commissioner for UNRWA aid also said earlier this year, that there was “a need” for reform in Palestinian education and called on the EU to consider making aid to the education sector conditional on “full adherence to UNESCO standards of peace, tolerance, co-existence [and] non-violence.”

A cross-party group of 26 MEPs from sixteen countries also called for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to investigate UNRWA, created to aid Palestinians, and to take disciplinary action against it over its alleged teaching of hate.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project. 

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Assistant Principal in Texas reassigned after Facebook post comparing vaccines to Holocaust surfaces

The Assistant Principal for Houston High School in Texas has been reassigned after an alleged Facebook post surfaced in which she compared vaccines to the Holocaust.

Houston High School Assistant Principal Janna Matykiewicz seemingly posted a Facebook status on 18th August that said: “What is the difference between vaccine papers and a yellow star? 82 years.”

The comparison has been made across the world, including in the United States, Canada, Ukraine and elsewhere, as anti-lockdown and anti-vaccination networks have become known as hotbeds of antisemitic conspiracy theories and tropes.

Germantown Municipal School District spokesperson Kate Crowder said this past Tuesday that “Ms. Matykiewicz is no longer an administrator at Houston High School, but is still employed by the district.” Crowder was said to have specified that Ms. Matykiewicz has been reassigned as a homebound teacher and interim liaison teacher. “Portions of the investigations are ongoing,” Ms Crowder added.

The creator of a Change.org petition titled “Fire Ms. Janna Matykiewicz” said that Ms Matykiewicz’s post was not only “a complete [sic] ignorant statement” but that it was “also completely antisemitic”. The creator also alleged that this was not Houston High School’s “first Holocaust-related incident” and asserted that the school’s yearbook featured people dressed up as Nazis.

It appears that a history teacher at the school, Tony Benzing, is also under investigation after he replied to her post with one of his own that read: “82 years…apparently a generation that doesn’t seem to know their History…the yellow star just targeted Jews…the vaccine papers don’t discriminate…but remember they first gamed the system to get Hitler appointed as Der Fuhrer, then they took over the media, police force, & educational system (Hitler Jugend)”

In June, the US State of Texas adopted the International Definition of Antisemitism.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Robert Rinder believes there is an existential threat to Jews in Britain, but has “an enduring belief in the British public”

In a recent interview, Robert Rinder has said that there is an existential threat to Jews in Britain.

Discussing his nephews’ Jewish school in North London, the barrister and television personality spoke of how their school hires private security guards and is surrounded by barbed wire. “So anybody who is sceptical about the idea that there is an existential threat [to Jews] needs to know that,” Mr Rinder said.

He also described former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn’s defending of the antisemitic mural in East London in 2018 as “a moment of real tragedy and crisis.” 

However, Mr Rinder was adamant that he still has hope for the future of British Jewry, stating: “It’s important to be mindful that there is still something in the British culture that eschews hate. 

“I have an enduring belief in the British public. That ultimately, for every one loud antisemite, there are hundreds, no, thousands of people that have the courage to stand up to it. I really do believe that.”

Mr Rinder is very active in the field of Holocaust education and recently received an MBE, along with his mother, for services to Holocaust Education.

In 2019, Mr Rinder spoke at the #TogetherAgainstAntisemitism rally in Parliament Square.

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CAA submits complaint against teacher and ex-union official who referred to “dirty Zionists” and made other inflammatory remarks

Campaign Against Antisemitism has submitted a complaint against a teacher and former union official who has reportedly referred to “dirty Zionists” and made other inflammatory remarks.

Latifa Abouchakra, who works in Ealing as a Citizenship and PHSE teacher, has reportedly shared a post on social media saying that “Zionism is not just racist and genocidal. It’s stark raving mad”; described the antisemitic terrorist and Iranian military leader Qasem Soleimani as a “hero”; and claimed that the antisemitic US Congresswoman Ilhan Omar is “considered a threat to the Zionist and Islamophobic elite in America”.

She has also share an image of a Jewish effigy represented as the devil and a post appearing to question why the Holocaust is memorialised at the expense of other genocides. She has further reportedly described Israel as an “illegal” and “colonial” state; talked of “Zionist elites” and complained of “Zionist influence in American politics”.

She also claimed, after a football player unveiled a Palestinian Authority flag at a match, that “Apparently the dirty Zionists have been complaining to Leicester City FC re the players showing their support for Palestine”.

At an event two years ago, the notorious antisemite Tony Greenstein reportedly stated that “Nazi Germany in a sense built the state of Israel at a crucial time and you can actually say that the state of Israel today is Hitler’s bastard offspring”. Ms Abouchakra, who was chairing the event, reportedly reacted saying “Can I just say that that was an excellent contribution and thank God it was a Jew that said it.” The antisemitic former Labour member Jackie Walker was among 50 attendees at that event.

Ms Abouchakra is a former official with the National Education Union (NEU), which has itself repeatedly come under fire lately in connection with antisemitism. When asked about Ms Abouchakra, who is apparently still a member, the union reportedly said: “The NEU deplores antisemitism and all forms of racism and treats these issues very seriously. The NEU is aware of the concerns raised. This matter will be dealt with as a matter of urgency and will be looked into according to the union’s internal processes relating to member conduct.”

According to her Twitter biography, Ms Abouchakra says that “References to Zionism = Israeli government and it’s [sic] supporters”. It is not clear when this misleading disclaimer was inserted.

A spokesperson for Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “These inflammatory posts are not remotely appropriate for someone charged with the education of our children. Offensive comments about ‘Zionists’, ‘dirty Zionists’ and ‘Zionist influence in American politics’ and sharing posts equating Zionism to racism, not to mention minimisation of the Holocaust and praise for an antisemitic terrorist commander, are unacceptable in the teaching profession, and we shall be submitting a complaint to the Teaching Regulation Agency. Antisemitism has no place in our schools or unions, and we expect the NEU to take disciplinary action to demonstrate where they stand on anti-Jewish racism.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has submitted a complaint to the Teaching Regulation Agency in respect of Ms Abouchakra.

Campaign Antisemitism has produced teachers’ guides for classes on antisemitism, which have been endorsed by the BBC. We have also recently produced a short resource for pupils and parents who encounter antisemitism at schools.Do you or your friends/family have stories of schoolteachers or pupils facing antisemitism at schools in the UK? Contact us at [email protected] or call +44 (0)330 822 0321.

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Concern from Jewish community leaders and Government officials over reports of growing far-right views among schoolchildren

There has been concern from both Jewish community leaders and Government officials over reports of growing far-right views among schoolchildren.

According to new figures that were released from the Home Office, out of over 300 people who were identified in 2019-2020 who could be seen to harbour radical views, 175 were below the age of twenty, with 70 being below the age of fourteen.

In addition to this, the majority of referrals for people with far-right views to the Government’s de-radicalisation scheme came after concerns had been raised either in school or from police.

A Home Office spokesperson said that the Government “is committed to confronting terrorism in all its forms, including from the extreme right wing. We remain focussed on disrupting the activities of the most dangerous extremists, supporting those who stand up to their hateful rhetoric, and protecting vulnerable people being drawn into terrorism.

“Protecting children from radicalisation forms part of schools’ wider safeguarding duties. We provide training, resources and direct support to help teachers understand when someone in their care may be at risk, and when to intervene.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism recently provided antisemitism training to the Department for Education.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has been monitoring and acting against the threat from the far-right for years and continues to support the authorities following suit.

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Investigation finds Massachusetts high school football team, whose coach was suspended over antisemitic on-field calling, may have been using anti-Jewish racist language for a decade

An independent investigation has found that a high school American football team in Massachusetts whose coach was recently suspended after the team used antisemitic language during a game may in fact have been using anti-Jewish racist language for a decade.

Duxbury High School, 30 miles from Boston, “severed ties” with Head Coach David Maimaron earlier this year following the allegations. Mr Maimaron, also a special-needs teacher, was placed on paid administrative leave pending the investigation. The school also hired attorney and educational consultant Edward Mitnick to assist its investigation into reports that team members used the offensive language – including a reference to Auschwitz – in its on-field play-calling. The words “rabbi” and “dreidel” were also heard.

In recent years Duxbury has been one of the most successful teams in Massachusetts, with five state championships since 2005. In a statement, the administration said: “The outrage is real, warranted, and we hear it. The fact that members of our school community used such offensive language…is horrifying and disappointing.”

District Superintendent John Antonucci noted that the offensive words had not been directed at the opposing team or at a particular player.

Mr Maimaron released a statement in which he apologised for “the insensitive, crass and inappropriate language used in the game on 12th March.” The language was “careless, unnecessary…hurtful and…inexcusable,” he said.

Mr Mitnick conducted the investigation at the request of Duxbury Public Schools. After interviewing dozens of witnesses, he released a 56-page report tfinding that there was “sufficient credible evidence to conclude that offensive and inappropriate conduct occurred” in violation of numerous school district policies, and that the problem was systematic and potentially dated as far back as 2010. It is believed that plays called “rabbit” soon evolved in “rabbi”, and other Jewish terms followed.

Elsewhere in the state, officials at Hurley Middle School said that a group of eighth-graders wrote antisemitic, sexual and racist messages in yearbooks at the Seekonk, MA school’s annual yearbook signing event.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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EU reportedly tries to suppress report that shows antisemitism rife in EU-funded Palestinian Authority textbooks

The European Union has reportedly tried to suppress a report that reveals that antisemitism is rife in EU-funded Palestinian Authority textbooks.

The 200-page report was produced by the Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research for the European Commission earlier this year and was reportedly kept from the public until the German newspaper Bild obtained a copy.

The report examines 156 textbooks and sixteen teachers’ guides from 2017-2020, revealing numerous examples of anti-Jewish racism that the report’s executive summary tries to downplay by insisting that, despite the overt racism, the textbooks nevertheless meet UNESCO standards. Earlier in the information-gathering process, IMPACT-se, an Israeli education watchdog, claimed that the Georg Eckert Institute was examining Israeli textbooks by mistake.

According to the report, the textbooks present “ambivalent – sometimes hostile – attitudes towards Jews and the characteristics they attribute to the Jewish people…Frequent use of negative attributions in relation to the Jewish people… suggest a conscious perpetuation of anti-Jewish prejudice, especially when embedded in the current political context.”

A religious studies textbook, for example, refers to “repeated attempts by the Jews to kill the prophet” and implies that the Jews are “enemies of Islam”, referencing also the “alleged perniciousness of the Jews”.

There are also numerous instances of glorification of violence and terrorism against Jews and of “resistance”, including in science and mathematics textbooks, using terror attacks to demonstrate scientific proofs and using terrorists as models of female empowerment. The report says of one female terrorist that there are “no further portraits of significant female figures in Palestinian history,” implying that “the path of violence [is] the only option for women to demonstrate an outstanding commitment to their people and country.”

 The European Commission reportedly said that it “takes this study seriously and will act on its findings as appropriate, with a view to bring about the full adherence to UNESCO standards in all Palestinian education materials,” and “reiterates its unequivocal commitment to the fight against antisemitism.” It has been promising a new strategy on fighting antisemitism for some time, amidst a significant increase in anti-Jewish racism in the bloc.

Following the leak of the report, IMPACT-se said in a statement: “This report confirms the findings published by IMPACT-se over the last five years. The question is, will EU policy-makers finally take action to condition EU funding to the PA [Palestinian Authority] on positive reforms to the curriculum as the European Parliament has demanded on several occasions.”

Antisemitism in Palestinian Authority and UNRWA textbooks funded by Britain, the EU and Western nations has been an ongoing problem for many years.

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Ofsted warns schools over antisemitism days after Education Secretary writes to headteachers as reports grow of anti-Jewish victimisation in the sector

Schools have been warned by their regulator, Ofsted, that they risk failing inspections if they do not act over antisemitism.

Following a meeting with representatives from the Jewish education sector and reports of anti-Jewish bullying at schools – including one teacher whose pupils competed to stick ‘Free Palestine’ stickers in their hair – Ofsted said that there was no place for antisemitism in schools and that it was supporting victims among teaching staff.

Recently, Jewish teachers have also lamented that their union, the National Education Union, has failed them, with a significant number resigning their membership en masse.

A spokesperson for Ofsted said: “Where these incidents occur, we want to see schools deal with them quickly and effectively, and any failure to do so will be reflected in our inspection judgements,” adding: “We also expect a school’s curriculum and teaching to promote equality of opportunity and diversity.”

Ofsted’s warning comes just days after Education Secretary Gavin Williamson wrote to headteachers urging action over antisemitism.

Campaign Antisemitism has produced teachers’ guides for classes on antisemitism, which have been endorsed by the BBC. We have also recently produced a short resource for pupils and parents who encounter antisemitism at schools.

Do you or your friends/family have stories of schoolteachers or pupils facing antisemitism at schools in the UK? We have received a significant number of reports and the Incident Response colleagues would be keen to hear of further examples if you could share them. Contact us at [email protected] or call +44 (0)330 822 0321.

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Teacher resigns after row over student dressed as Hitler

A teacher has resigned following a controversy at a New Jersey primary school after a student assignment about Adolf Hitler was criticised as glorifying the Nazi leader and diminishing the Holocaust.

The row blew up when a pupil from Maugham Elementary School in Tenafly allegedly dressed up as Hitler where the images were then reportedly shared on social media. Text from the class project was also said to have been shared. Writing in the first person from the perspective of Hitler, the pupil wrote: “I was very popular and many people followed me until I died. My belif [sic] in antisemitism drove me to kill more than 6 million Jews.”

The backlash began soon after the Facebook post by Lori Birk who said that “the assignment” had been sent to her by a friend with a child at the school who was concerned that the photo and text had been prominently displayed in “a school hallway.”

On her post, which has been removed, Ms Birk wrote that it was “ignorance, antisemitism and hatred taught at a fifth grade level,” adding: “Shame on the parents who helped their child dress as Hitler and the teacher who has approved such hatred.”

In a joint statement with the school board, Tenafly Public Schools Superintendent Shauna DeMarco explained that the project had been to “look at historical figures who personified good and evil” and in that context, it was “unfair to judge any student or teacher.”

Ms DeMarco also noted that the teacher involved “happens to be Jewish” and had “asked students to speak from the perspective of one of these individuals.” People seeing the students’ projects “displayed in the school” did not understand the project, “resulting in justifiable concerns.”

Following its investigation, the school board voted to accept the resignation of the unnamed teacher and reinstated the school Principal Jennifer Ferrara. School board President Jocelyn Schwarz said the administration would work with Ms Ferrara to “foster a safe learning environment.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Jewish teacher physically abused after pupils “competed” to stick Palestinian Authority flags on their hair and clothing

A Jewish teacher at a non-Jewish school was physically abused after their pupils “competed” to stick Palestinian Authority flags on their hair and clothing, it was reported this week.

The teacher, who chose to remain anonymous, said that they were targeted because they were Jewish, and immediately resigned following the incident.

They said: “The whole school was full of Palestine flags, the pupils all began shouting ‘Free Palestine’.

“At the beginning, I thought they were just making a statement for all the teachers, but then I realised it was targeted to me and other teachers that are Jewish.”

Detailing the incident, they went on to say: “They [the pupils] were trying to stick Free Palestine stickers in my hair, I broke into tears, I couldn’t take my class that morning.”

The teacher claims that the school’s senior leadership offered no support whatsoever.

Recently, Education Secretary Gavin Williamson wrote to schools demand that they act against antisemitism and the politicisation of classrooms.

A spokesperson for Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “We applaud the Education Secretary for raising awareness of antisemitism in schools. We have received multiple reports of antisemitic incidents targeting Jewish pupils and teachers, and just last week one Jewish school advised its pupils to conceal garments that might identify them as Jewish. We recently published a short resource for parents and schoolchildren who encounter anti-Jewish hate, and we continue to urge the community to be vigilant and to report any incidents.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism recently published a short resource on “What to do about antisemitism at school” for children and parents, which helps identify antisemitism using the International Definition of Antisemitism and provides pointers on how to act when antisemitic incidents arise.

Do you or your friends/family have stories of schoolteachers or pupils facing antisemitism at schools in the UK? We have received a significant number of reports and the Incident Response colleagues would be keen to hear of further examples if you could share them. Contact us at [email protected] or call +44 (0)330 822 0321.

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CAA applauds Education Secretary for demanding schools act against antisemitism and politicisation of classrooms

Campaign Against Antisemitism applauds the Education Secretary’s decision to demand that schools act against antisemitism and the politicisation of classrooms.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has, in recent days, held urgent meetings with multiple Cabinet ministers, including the Prime Minister, to seek immediate intervention against surging antisemitism.

Gavin Williamson has told schools to ensure that they maintain “political impartiality” after the recent surge in antisemitism in the wake of the conflict between Israel and Gaza.

Mr Williamson, noting the recent victimisation of many Jewish students and teachers, said: “Schools should ensure that political expression by senior pupils is conducted sensitively, avoiding disruption for other pupils and staff.

“It is unacceptable to allow some pupils to create an atmosphere of intimidation or fear for other students and teachers.

“School leaders and staff have a responsibility to ensure that they act appropriately, particularly in the political views they express.”

Mr Williamson added that schools should not work with organisations which do not recognise Israel’s right to exist.

Recently, the Education Secretary wrote to the Office for Students on the matter of adoption of the International Definition of Antisemitism.

In his letter, which covered numerous topics relating to universities and campus life, Mr Williamson called for the Office for Students to undertake “a scoping exercise to identify providers which are reluctant to adopt the definition”.

Campaign Against Antisemitism recently published a short resource on “What to do about antisemitism at school” for children and parents, which helps identify antisemitism using the International Definition of Antisemitism and provides pointers on how to act when antisemitic incidents arise.

A spokesperson for Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “We applaud the Education Secretary for raising awareness of antisemitism in schools. We have received multiple reports of antisemitic incidents targeting Jewish pupils and teachers, and just last week one Jewish school advised its pupils to conceal garments that might identify them as Jewish. We recently published a short resource for parents and schoolchildren who encounter anti-Jewish hate, and we continue to urge the community to be vigilant and to report any incidents.”

Do you or your friends/family have stories of schoolteachers or pupils facing antisemitism at schools in the UK? We have received a significant number of reports and the Incident Response colleagues would be keen to hear of further examples if you could share them. Contact us at [email protected] or call +44 (0)330 822 0321.

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JFS staff quit National Education Union en masse over concerns about antisemitism

At least 25 members of the National Education Union (NEU) from JFS have reportedly quit over concerns about antisemitism.

The resignations over the past few weeks come as Kevin Courtney, the NEU’s Joint General Secretary, spoke at antisemitism-infested rallies in the past fortnight.

There were also general concerns that the NEU’s stance on the conflict between Israel and Hamas was unbalanced, with some JFS staffers alleging that the NEU failed to condemn Hamas, an antisemitic genocidal terrorist organisation.

John Lopez, a former NEU representative at JFS, said: “I felt I had no choice to leave the Union which isolated me as a Jewish, pro-Israel, teacher. I spent close to two years trying to get the NEU (starting with Brent Branch) to adopt the [International Definition of Antisemitism] so Jewish NEU members can feel safer, as well as writing letters with others to Educate magazine which were ignored. 

“Most recently they urged NEU members to join the PSC [Palestine Solidarity Campaign] rally for Palestine which involved antisemitism and calls for the abolition of the Jewish State. The NEU have picked a side which is not only anti-Israel but indifferent to Jews. I am glad I am no longer part of this Union,” he added.

Research conducted by Campaign Against Antisemitism has previously revealed widespread antisemitism amongst supporters of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign.

There was also discontentment among Jewish teachers, with one claiming that she was muted on an NEU Facebook page after she wrote: “I wish to cancel my membership, with immediate effect. This is due to the union’s continuous and in my opinion biased involvement with demonstrations that have unfortunately seen a rise of antisemitic attacks against one of the smallest UK communities. A teaching union should be impartial, as we are a professional body, who must represent these strong ethics and values in our schools. I do not feel comfortable being part of a union that encourages (although not necessarily intended) antisemitism. This is not why I became a teacher. I expect my membership to be terminated immediately.”

Recently, a Jewish school advised their students to cover their skullcaps and avoid wearing their school blazers in public.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has reported on pupils and teachers being intimidated by peers in connection to the conflict between Israel and Hamas and published a short resource for children and parents facing antisemitism in schools.

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Jewish school advises pupils to wear hats over their skullcaps and cover school blazers in public as reports of antisemitism skyrocket including violent assaults

A prominent Jewish school has advised its pupils to wear hats over their skullcaps and to cover their school blazers in public as reports of antisemitism have risen 568 percent within the last seventeen days, equating to some 267 reported incidents. Reported incidents are lower than actual incidents as reports can take time to process and many incidents go entirely unreported.

The letter from the school’s headmaster, which was sent out to parents, read: “I am writing to remind you and your children about the need for enhanced awareness and caution with regard to security in these troubled times. Of course, the news of the recent ceasefire was most welcome, but I fear that the tensions and the incidents of antisemitism in this country will be slow to decline.

“We still advise all boys to wear a cap over their kippah when travelling to and from school, but we are also now suggesting that not wearing the College blazer (or at least covering it with a coat) on those journeys is an additional, sensible precaution for all pupils.

“It is sad that this should be necessary, but safety is – as ever – our top priority.”

The rise in incidents come in the wake of the conflict between Israel and Hamas. These incidents include mezuzahs being vandalised in Borehamwood, a rabbi in Essex being assaulted and hospitalised, and a convoy of cars which drove down the Finchley Road shouting “F*** the Jews…rape their daughters” through a megaphone.

However, despite a ceasefire being announced last week, several more incidents were reported over the weekend. After a demonstration on Sunday in support of Israel, counter-demonstrators were seen roaming the surrounding streets looking for Jewish people to target.

Another incident which took place after the rally saw two visibly Jewish men assaulted outside of a kosher restaurant. A video uploaded to Twitter by the activist Joseph Cohen shows the alleged victims describing the assault. One said: “We crossed the street and the next thing we know, we turn around and they’re essentially swinging for us.”

The other added: “They connected a few punches…[we] got hit in the head, got kicked.”

A woman across the road invited them into her café where they then called the police.

We are continuing to hear of incidents and urge the Jewish community around the country to remain vigilant.

Campaign Against Antisemitism’s analysis of Home Office statistics shows that an average of over three hate crimes are directed at Jews every single day in England and Wales, with Jews almost four times more likely to be targets of hate crimes than any other faith group.

Campaign Against Antisemitism’s Antisemitism Barometer 2020 showed that three in five British Jews believe that the authorities, in general, are not doing enough to address and punish antisemitism.

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Disgraced former MP Chris Williamson says “Zionist teachers around the country are violating children’s rights” and brands Zionism “a racist ideology”

Disgraced former MP Chris Williamson has tweeted that “Zionist teachers around the country are violating children’s rights” and that Zionism is “a racist ideology.”

He went on to say that Zionism “has no place in society – especially in the classroom”, and offered support to any parents whose child “has been affected by Zionist extremism from teachers or headteachers.”

Mr Williamson, who was suspended from the Labour Party several times before running as an Independent in the 2019 General Election and receiving so few votes that, extraordinarily for an incumbent MP, he lost his deposit, has been embroiled in controversy over comments about Jews, “Zionists” and antisemitism for a long time.

Last year, Royal Holloway’s Students’ Union disinvited Mr Williamson from a Debating Society event in order to comply with its policy on hate speech.

He also has a close association with David Miller, the conspiracy theorist academic at the University of Bristol who is being investigated over inflammatory comments that he made about Jewish students.

Campaign Against Antisemitism’s Antisemitism Barometer 2019 showed that antisemitism on the far-left of British politics has surpassed that of the far-right.

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Abingdon schoolboy expelled after allegedly sending antisemitic image to Jewish student

A fifteen-year-old Abingdon schoolboy has been expelled after allegedly sending an antisemitic image to a Jewish student from the same school.

The image, sent through the social media app Snapchat, was said to have depicted three people dressed as Nazis soldiers.

The teenager also allegedly created a video on Tik Tok, another social media app, in which he was said to have joked about raping a woman from a different Tik Tok video.  

The Headmaster of the prestigious Oxfordshire boarding school, Michael Windsor, said that the videos were “grossly racist and sexist”. He added: “These incidents do not just contravene our Behaviour, Rewards and Sanctions Policy but they go completely against the ethos and culture of the school based on courtesy, kindness and respect.”

The schoolboy has issued a response, stating: “I am deeply sorry and regretful of my stupid actions. I deeply regret my actions and I understand that people could get offended by them very easily but I had no intention of offending or hurting someone’s feelings. In the small amount of time I have had to think about my disgraceful actions, I can certainly confirm that not a single thing I said was intended with harm or to offend anyone. I understand now that it would and I regret posting those things, it was a lack of judgment before when posting, and I did not think about all the people that would see my profile. I am deeply sorry and I promise that this will not happen again.”

However, the boy’s parents defended their son, arguing that social media is not real life and therefore that the punishment should not be too severe, claiming that the videos were “just jokes”.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has long called for tougher regulations on social media sites and that social networks proactively search for and remove hate speech from their platforms.

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“Curse on Jews” and calls on children to “fight against the tyranny of the Jews” found across educational materials in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen

Explicitly hostile attitudes to Jewish people and Israel, including repeated use of the slogan “curse on the Jews” have been found in educational materials in Yemen.

A newly released report by the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School (IMPACT-se) reveals a violent and hostile attitude to Jewish people in materials published in areas of Yemen controlled by the rebel Houthis, the Iranian proxy whose organisation is known as Ansar Allah.  The report points out that Ansar Allah’s attitudes to Jews closely mirror those of its Iranian backers.

IMPACT-se notes that “Violence and jihad are expressly encouraged” and that the materials contain “explicit antisemitism”, including manipulated images relating to the Holocaust and children urged to “fight against the tyranny of the Jews.” It also states that the Houthi Ansar Allah slogan, “death to Israel, curse on the Jews,” is seen repeatedly throughout the material.

IMPACT-se states that while Ansar Allah has “made education a core tenet” of its campaign to increase its influence in Yemen, the “hatred, glorification of violence” and “worldview of its materials” are contrary to “UNESCO standards of peace and tolerance and are unacceptable in any society.”

IMPACT-se CEO Marcus Sheff said that the report offered “a worrying insight into the violent mindset” of Ansar Allah and was “an extreme example of how education can be weaponised to perpetuate conflict.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Abingdon schoolboy faces expulsion after allegedly sending antisemitic image to Jewish student

An fifteen-year-old Abingdon schoolboy is facing expulsion after allegedly sending an antisemitic image to a Jewish student from the same school.

The image, sent through the social media app Snapchat, was said to have depicted three people dressed as Nazis soldiers.

The teenager also allegedly created a video on Tik Tok, another social media app, whereby he was said to have joked about raping a woman from a different Tik Tok video.  

The Headmaster of the prestigious Oxfordshire boarding school, Michael Windsor, said that the videos were “grossly racist and sexist”. He added: “These incidents do not just contravene our Behaviour, Rewards and Sanctions Policy but they go completely against the ethos and culture of the school based on courtesy, kindness and respect.”

The schoolboy has issued a response, stating: “I am deeply sorry and regretful of my stupid actions. I deeply regret my actions and I understand that people could get offended by them very easily but I had no intention of offending or hurting someone’s feelings. In the small amount of time I have had to think about my disgraceful actions, I can certainly confirm that not a single thing I said was intended with harm or to offend anyone. I understand now that it would and I regret posting those things, it was a lack of judgement before when posting, and I did not think about all the people that would see my profile. I am deeply sorry and I promise that this will not happen again.”

However, the boy’s parents defended their son, arguing that social media is not real life and therefore that the punishment should not be too severe, claiming that the videos were “just jokes”.

A spokesperson for Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “It seems that the schoolboy has grasped the gravity of his actions far better than his parents who seem to think that Nazism and rape are joking matters. Unfortunately, social media is exposing young minds to the most appalling material, and in addition to firm regulation of social media companies, it is vital that schools and parents are vigilant and set a firm example. We hope that the school will apply a suitably serious penalty, even as this boy’s parents irresponsibly dismiss his conduct as ‘jokes’.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has long called for tougher regulations on social media sites and that social networks proactively search for and remove hate speech from their platforms.

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Alameda High School students spread distressing antisemitic images over social media

Alameda High School students have spread distressing antisemitic and racist images through social media platforms like Instagram and Twitter.

The images involved students acting out Nazi salutes, usage of the N-word and praising Hitler.

However, students and parents from the Californian school have issued complaints to the school administrators.

One of the students wrote: “Someone please explain to me when antisemitism became a joke. Glorifying and joking about something that was a traumatic and horrific thing that killed millions of people is absolutely disgusting.”

In a letter to the parents, Principal Robert Ithurburn wrote: “I cannot stress enough that this should not and cannot happen and when students do it they are either espousing a statement of hate or putting themselves into a position to be assumed to be. It is true that young people do things that they regret and that they should have an opportunity to learn from their mistakes.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Antisemitic propaganda found in Jordanian textbooks despite Government’s promise to promote tolerance

Textbooks in Jordanian classrooms have been found to promote antisemitic tropes and propaganda.

The revelation comes despite the Jordanian Government’s earlier plans to repackage school textbooks in order to promote tolerance.

The ADL, which carried out a study and rigorous translation, found “particularly troubling examples in first and second semester textbooks for the seventh grade course on Islamic Education.”

In an autumn textbook, a story involving a Jewish tribe included the antisemitic explanation: “the Jews broke their pact with the Muslims, as is their custom always.” The chapter ends on the multiple-choice question: “Among the characteristics of the Jews for which they are renowned are: (A) the breaking of pacts, (B) treachery and treason, (C) hating Muslims, or (D) all of the above.”

A spring textbook taught the antisemitic trope that Jews are responsible for the death of Jesus, stating: “The Israelites who did not believe in Jesus, peace be upon him, wanted to be rid of him and eliminate his call, so they tried to kill him.”

A twelfth-grade history textbook describes Zionism as “a racist, settler political movement aimed at establishing a national homeland for the Jews in Palestine, founded on historical claims without basis in truth,” and claims all Jewish ties with Jerusalem are “founded on historical and religious claims without any actual grounds on which to base them.”

According to the ADL, these textbooks are still under official authorisation from the Government.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Two swastikas etched in wall at New Jersey high school

Police are investigating after two swastikas were found etched into a wall at a New Jersey high school.

In a statement, police said that they were investigating the antisemitic symbols found on the wall of a lavatory stall at Westfield High School. The President of the Board of Education, Amy Root, and the Principal, Mary Asfendis, both condemned the “disturbing” antisemitic vandalism.

Ms Root said: “I am very disappointed that there are those in our community who fail to understand the serious impact caused by these hateful symbols.” She added: “We will continue to look for ways to reinforce the message…that hate will not be tolerated.”

In an email to parents, Ms Asfendis said that the symbols had been “promptly removed” and added: “This act of antisemitism is disturbing as we work each day to…teach our students that hateful words and acts are inexcusable.”

Noting that Westfield students had recently led a “community conversation on antisemitism”, she said: “We need to engage in more of these dialogues, at home and in school, to help others understand the power of that symbol of hate, and the pain that it continues to cause.”

Despite how upsetting it was, said Ms Asfendis, it was the act of an individual and “does not represent who we are as a community or that we tolerate any acts of hatred, antisemitism or racism at Westfield High School.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

Image credit: Google

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Disgraced peer Shami Chakrabarti who authored whitewash report into Labour antisemitism tells pupils not to leave victims of discrimination to “stand up for themselves”

The disgraced peer, Baroness Chakrabarti, has given a speech on gender equality to the prestigious St Paul’s School in London, in which she said that pupils must not leave victims of discrimination to “stand up for themselves”.

Baroness Chakrabarti, whose infamous 2016 whitewash report into Labour antisemitism began with the words “The Labour Party is not overrun with antisemitism”, made a speech to pupils, alumni and guests via Zoom on the subject of “Gender Solidarity and Freedom” on 11th March, despite the controversy surrounding her invitation.

At the end of the session, she took questions from the audience, but she and the host did not present any of the questions submitted on Labour antisemitism or her relations with Jewish women.

The questions that were ignored included: “Your eponymous report on antisemitism in the Labour Party opened with the words: ‘The Labour Party is not overrun with antisemitism’. The Equality and Human Rights Commission, in its damning verdict, found that the Party had become institutionally antisemitic, including in the period covered by your report. How do you answer those who say that you accepted a peerage in return for whitewashing antisemitism in the Labour Party and that through that betrayal of British Jews, you prolonged and worsened a crisis that polling shows led half of British Jews to consider leaving the country?”

Questions on the topic of Labour antisemitism were ignored despite an assurance from the school’s High Master to one alumnus in advance of the talk that the matter of the event proceeding “does not mean that those listening cannot challenge her on her record in relation to the Labour Party should they wish to do so and it seems to me to be part of the Pauline tradition to enter into debate but also to question.”

Other excluded questions included: “What are your thoughts on hypocritical women – such as those that advocate for alliance with minority women but fail to do so – do for gender inequality?”

The hour-long address ended with the host inviting Baroness Chakrabarti back to speak again.

Shortly after publishing the findings of her “inquiry” into Labour antisemitism, Baroness Chakrabarti nominated for a peerage by Jeremy Corbyn.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has offered to present a session to pupils on antisemitism, which the all-boys school has accepted.

The Labour Party was found by the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) to have engaged in unlawful discrimination and harassment of Jews. The report followed the EHRC’s investigation of the Labour Party in which Campaign Against Antisemitism was the complainant, submitting hundreds of pages of evidence and legal argument. Sir Keir Starmer called the publication of the report a “day of shame” for the Labour Party.

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CAA asks St Paul’s School why disgraced peer Shami Chakrabarti who authored whitewash report into Labour antisemitism will address pupils on “equality between people”

Shami Chakrabarti has been invited to speak at the prestigious St Paul’s School on the subject of “equality between people” on the occassion of International Women’s Day, despite her role whitewashing antisemitism within the Labour Party.

Following a complaint to us from an appalled alumnus, Campaign Against Antisemitism has written to the High Master of the boys’ school to ask why the disgraced peer has been invited to speak tomorrow, to insist that she is challenged on her role whitewashing anti-Jewish racism in the Labour Party, and to make welfare arrangements for Jewish students and anyone else affected by her address.

The alumnus told Campaign Against Antisemitism: “My old school St Paul’s has invited Chakrabarti to speak at an event to mark International Womens’ Day on Tuesday. I and several other Jewish alumni have objected to the High Master as we don’t feel that she is suitable to be given a platform at the school, given her contribution to the continuation of antisemitism which she could have snuffed out with the position and power she had. I also don’t believe she did very much to help Margaret Hodge, Ruth Smeeth, Luciana Berger and so many other women Labour Party members who were subjected to antisemitism after the publication of her joke of a report.

“The school’s response is that they haven’t asked her to talk about antisemitism or Labour so it’s fine that she still speaks regardless of the offence it has caused and will cause Jews. They quote freedom of speech, debate, open-mindedness etc. to justify not cancelling her engagement.”

The talk can be attended by anyone who registers.

Baroness Chakrabarti launched an inquiry into antisemitism within the Labour Party during Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership. The report was widely condemned as a whitewash. Baroness Chakrabarti was then awarded a peerage in 2016 by Mr Corbyn, despite his previous pledge not to nominate anyone for peerages.

A spokesperson for Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “Baroness Chakrabarti’s whitewash report into antisemitism in Labour set back the fight against racism in the Party by years, causing untold distress to the Jewish community. It is most regrettable that St Paul’s has chosen to honour her with this platform, and we have written to the High Master to this effect. If the event does go ahead, there must be opportunity for her shameful record to be challenged and appropriate arrangements must be put in place for Jewish and other pupils who do not wish to attend or who are adversely affected. We have also offered to provide a presentation on antisemitism to pupils, which can help illuminate the extent of the damage Baroness Chakrabarti did in the months prior to receiving her peerage.”

Four years after Baroness Chakrabarti’s shameful whitewash report, the Labour Party was found by the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) to have engaged in unlawful discrimination and harassment of Jews. The report followed the EHRC’s investigation of the Labour Party in which Campaign Against Antisemitism was the complainant, submitting hundreds of pages of evidence and legal argument. Current leader Sir Keir Starmer called the publication of the report a “day of shame” for the Labour Party.

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Primary school and education resource provider apologise after handing seven year olds homework teaching that the Jews killed Jesus

An educational resource site and the headteacher of a primary school have apologised after seven-year-olds were handed homework teaching them that the Jews killed Jesus.

Joanne Bell, the mother of a child who was handed the sheet, posted a picture of the antisemitic homework to Twitter. It showed a drawing with a depiction of Jesus standing in front of Roman leader Pontius, whilst a hook-nosed Jew is bending down to whisper to Pontius in a conspiratorial manner.

Alongside, the text reads: “The Jewish leaders wanted Jesus to be guilty…eventually they asked him if he was the son of God. Jesus replied ‘I am’. This was enough. They said this was an insult to God. Jesus was taken before Pontius Pilate, the Roman Governor. The Jewish people, who wanted Jesus to die, persuaded the people to set free a murderer called Barabbas. Pilate asked what he should do with Jesus, known as ‘king of the Jews’. ‘Crucify him!’ shouted the people.”

Ms Bell wrote: “Got to love Britain, doing my child’s RE [Religious Education] home-schooling today. Why not teach the Blood Libel, hey. What harm has it ever done to portray Jews as bloodthirsty and solely responsible for the death of the believed son of G-d, Jesus. I am in shock. This for seven-year olds.”

Topmarks – the education website responsible for creating and distributing the homework – blocked Joanne when she raised the issue, but it unblocked her a day later, with the head of the company tweeting an apology.

He wrote: “Hello Joanne. Sorry for the delay, I’ve been unwell post-vaccine. We are sorry for any offense to or misrepresentation of the Jewish community, it was not our intention, and we have removed the Bible story. Thank you for bringing it to our attention. I have unblocked you.”

Another user then asked why Ms Bell had been blocked in the first place, to which Mr Spolton replied: “It was an unnecessary mistake.” When Ms Bell questioned how the material ended up on the website in the first place, Mr Spolton replied: “I was young and naive. It was written circa twenty years ago based on books found in the local library, and the dated images were downloaded clip art. I literally hadn’t reviewed the story for decades and had pretty much forgotten about it. I’m glad you contacted me with your concerns and that I’ve been able to remove it quickly.”

Ms Bell, who has done a service by drawing attention to this material, updated followers as the homework was pulled from the primary school – which Ms Bell has not named – with an apology from the “horrified” headteacher.

A spokesperson from Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “The notion that the Jews killed Jesus is an antisemitic trope which dates back millennia. It has been used as a supposed justification for the persecution of Jews in the Christian world for centuries and is often cited in abuse of Jews even today. It is sickening that this material was presented to young children as factual education. The apologies from Topmarks and the school in question are welcome, as is the withdrawal of the textbook, but educational material for children, particularly in sensitive fields, must be written and vetted by reliable experts. For Topmarks to be offering materials that, by its own admission, were created by someone so ‘naive’ as to present a blood libel as fact, and not to review those materials in decades is unacceptable.”

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Boston school official resigns after calling Jewish official “kike” on TV

A school official in a Boston suburb who referred to a Jewish official on television as a “kike” has announced his resignation.

Robert “Bob” Hoey Jr, a member of the school committee in Lowell, Massachusetts, was on a local talk show when he used the antisemitic slur while referring to a Jewish former official.

Two days later, a local news outlet reported that Mr Hoey had announced his resignation via Facebook Live.

On the video – which is no longer available – Mr Hoey reportedly said that he had “a big mouth” and “no control” over how he talked. He apologised to the official and said that “that word” should be condemned.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Far-right group publishes “alternative” syllabus for children condemned as “poison” and “hateful”

A far-right group that tries to recruit youth to its ideology has published an online “alternative” home school curriculum condemned as “poison” and “hateful”.

Patriotic Alternative claims that 10,000 people a month are accessing the curriculum. The group says: “With our help, your children can learn about their history and culture in a balanced and age-appropriate manner, free from the shackles and ideology of the National Curriculum.”

The group is led by the former head of the youth wing of the BNP, Mark Collett, who is reported to have dabbled in Holocaust denial, collaborated with the infamous American antisemite David Duke, and espoused antisemitic and racist views.

A report into Patriotic Alternative published last summer found that several members of the group engaged in Holocaust denial.

MPs and Ofsted officials have condemned the syllabus, with one MP saying: “We have seen far-right activity and racist attacks increase in the pandemic. Groups such as Patriotic Alternative use lockdown as an opportunity to peddle their hateful ideology.” Another described the curriculum as an attempt to “poison children’s education”.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has been monitoring and acting against the threat from the far-right for years and continues to support the authorities following suit.

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Kindergarten teacher sacked for “demonic” Jews tweet

A kindergarten teacher in Charlotte, North Carolina was sacked after posting an abusive and antisemitic tweet that talked about “demonic” Jews.

The tweet, from Jarrin Wooten’s account, stated: “Hitler was trying to keep those demonic … Rothschilds and fractional reserve banks out of Germany and then we let those same ‘Jews’ come to America and teach us he was a terrorist…all I’ll say is look into it some more.”

After a Jewish watchdog group tied Mr Wooten to the Charlotte school, the regional superintendent began an investigation.

Mr Wooten initially claimed that his account had been hacked and said that, as someone who had “experienced racism,” he would not post such a tweet. Shortly after, the school board chair, Bryan Ives, issued a statement saying the claim was false and the teacher had been sacked. The tweet violated the school’s social media and discrimination policies, said Mr Ives adding that “hateful speech and discrimination against any person of any religion, race or colour,” would not be tolerated.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Swastikas appear at Kansas City prep school

A swastika and antisemitic graffiti were discovered on a student’s desk at the Pembroke Hill School, Kansas City on 27th January. The incident occurred on the same day that the school formally recognised International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

School officials have declined to provide further details on the contents of the antisemitic graffiti.

A Jewish parent of a student at the school claimed that this vandalism is not an isolated incident and it is rather part of an increasingly concerning pattern. According to local press, several incidents of antisemitic behaviour have been reported at Pembroke Hill School, including swastikas graffitied across a Jewish student’s locker and a bathroom wall. On another occasion, a student allegedly raised his arm in a Nazi salute while shouting antisemitic epithets at a Jewish student.

In a letter to parents on 27th January, the head of the school maintained that the recent incident would be harnessed to educate the community and student body on the impact of intolerance and prejudice, and the importance of respect.

Pembroke Hill School officials stated that disciplinary action will be taken against whoever is responsible for the recent incident and the school will continue to uphold a zero tolerance for actions or symbols that reinforce “any form of bigotry”. The school has been unable to identify the perpetrator, however it remains under investigation.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Rome students marking Holocaust Remembrance Day Zoombombed by Neo-Nazis

A Rome High School was Zoombombed with antisemitic slurs during the screening of a film to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Students and teachers of the Istituto Tecnico Federico Caffé were on Zoom during the screening of the film made at the technical high school, entitled “The Wandering Jew in 20th-century Art.”

The Zoom meeting was interrupted by comments on the “chat” function, including, “Viva Hitler,” “I will kill all you bastards” and “Open the ovens”.

Staff believe that the meeting may have been “bombed” because a link was sent to neo-fascist groups.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has warned about the phenomenon of Zoombombing over the past year, as video gatherings have become more common during the period of pandemic lockdowns.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Antisemitic slurs as elite San Francisco school’s virtual lesson is hacked

Antisemitic and anti-black racist slurs and pornographic images appeared online when a virtual lesson being given by an elite San Francisco school was hacked.

According to the San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD), the hacking took place during an anti-racism talk to students of Lowell High School. The SFUSD said that students were using the Padlet platform to share reflections on anti-racism lessons when the messages and images appeared.

The SFUSD said its Department of Technology were trying to identify the hacker and trace the origin of the posts.

Lowell principal Dacotah Swett issued a video statement, saying: “My heart goes out to the members of our community who were targeted — our Black and Jewish students.” Directing comments to the perpetrators, she said that she would pursue “by all means available” to her those who made “these racist and antisemitic attacks on our community.”

Noting that their “words and actions” had no place at Lowell, she added: “Your actions constitute hate speech and you will be held accountable.”

Students from Lowell High School have complained about ongoing racism at the elite school where nearly 70% of students are either Asian-American or White. Less than 2% of students are Black, and 12% are Hispanic.

The San Francisco Chronicle reported that a petition had been started by a Lowell teacher and black student calling for a federal investigation into the hacking.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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CAA teachers’ guide on antisemitism launched as resource by BBC Teach

Campaign Against Antisemitism is proud that our teachers’ guide on antisemitism for Years 5-13 is now also available through BBC Teach.

The guide is available in two versions: Love Thy Neighbour, designed specifically for Church of England schools, and Love Your Neighbour, for Catholic schools. Both versions are also suitable for all other schools, and versions for other faiths and non-denominational schools are also in production.

The guides are intended for use with an accompanying student-friendly PowerPoint presentation, which is also available on our website and through BBC Teach.

These guides, which were prepared by a former teacher who refined this material whilst speaking to 25,000 children in over 100 schools, provide information for teachers on topics such as prejudice, stereotyping, bullying and the importance of being an upstander and not a bystander. They also complement numerous bases.

You can download the guides here or visit BBC Teach here.

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Morocco to teach Jewish history and culture following ‘normalisation’ agreement

In what has been called a “ground-breaking” move, Morocco has announced that its schools will begin teaching Jewish history and culture as part of the official curriculum.

The recent announcement follows the recent peace deal between the Muslim nation and Israel, brokered by the USA, under which Morocco’s head of state, King Mohammed VI, agreed to normalise relations with Israel.

The decision on the curriculum was reportedly made earlier as part of a revamp of Morocco’s national curriculum which, according to Fouad Chafiqi of the Education Ministry, aimed to “highlight Morocco’s diverse identity”.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Antisemitic graffiti discovered outside school in Italy’s Lazio region

Antisemitic graffiti was sprayed on the ground outside a school in Italy’s Lazio region.

Referencing Lazio football club, it read “Laziale ebreo” which roughly translates as “Lazio-supporting Jews”.

Last year, similar graffiti, which also featured a swastika, was found nearby.

The head of the Lazio Region Nicola Zingaretti expressed his concern and said that he hoped the perpetrators would be found.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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FBI joins investigation into hack of Long Island Jewish school’s website with Nazi images and slurs

The website of the North Shore Hebrew Academy High School’s was overtaken with antisemitic images, offensive slurs and songs in a cyber attack that occurred on 14th December.

The homepage presented a large swastika with a video clip of marching Nazi SS guards, and another section read “North Shore Hebrew Death Camp”. One page included details of a “field trip” to Auschwitz and listed the application deadline as “January 1945”. The description stated that students would be made to “walk into an SS office and declare themselves as Jews”.

Personal information, including the addresses and credit card details, of students and staff at the Long Island school were also harvested in the suspected cyber-breach.

The hacking of the website is believed to have lasted several hours before the webpage was taken down by administrators.

The Headmaster of the school has reassured the community that the Nassau County Police are currently investigating the incident, and the FBI has now joined the investigation.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Saudi textbooks remove or tone down antisemitic content

A review of Saudi Arabia’s 2020-2021 schools curriculum has revealed that school textbooks had been revised to remove or tone down antisemitic content.

The educational research institute IMPACT-se found that among the tropes removed was that Jews control and manipulate the world. Its CEO said that the trend has been observable since the early 2000s, but that the new 2020 textbooks “represent an institutional effort to modernise the Kingdom’s curriculum.

A chapter questioning Israel’s right to exist has also been removed.

While many controversial ideas were excised, problems still remain, according to the report. Zionism, for example, is still presented as a racist movement and the term “Zionist enemy” is still common.

The report also points out that moderation efforts have been tried and failed before, so “more time” was needed to determine if the changes are permanent.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Holocaust denial and rape threats made against Jewish pupils in California in second wave of antisemitic incidents to hit same high school

A California high school was in the spotlight for the second time last week after it emerged that students had been subjected to a second wave of offensive social media posts that included Holocaust denial and threats of rape.

In an email to parents, the principal of Redwood High School in Marin County, David Sondheim, revealed that the most recent social media posts again targeted Jewish students and families “with hateful messages” including denying the Holocaust, rape and homophobia.”

The disclosure marks the second time this year that Redwood High School has experienced antisemitism directed at its students.

In September, an Instagram account was found to be targeting specific Jewish students at Redwood. The account, which has now been removed, was named “Redwood students organised against Semitism.” It was accompanied by an antisemitic caricature.

Local schools’ superintendent, Tara Taupier reportedly said that it was not clear who was behind the latest incidents, but that the perpetrators had used the same caricature as appeared on the earlier Instagram account. Ms Taupier said that her office was “still engaged with law enforcement” to try to identify the perpetrator of the earlier antisemitic posts.

One Redwood parent reportedly told the media that antisemitism at the school had often gone unaddressed over the years, but that this occasion was “different, because they’re threatening to rape students.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Parents of children subjected to antisemitic bullying at Australian school blast official report for failing to deliver justice to victims

An inquiry was launched over the summer into antisemitic bullying at Brighton Secondary College (BSC) in Melbourne, Australia following an investigative report by a local Jewish newspaper.

The 124-page report discovered an extensive list of alleged incidences of bullying “that spanned years”. It included descriptions into how one Jewish student had been lured to a local park where he was subsequently robbed and assaulted by fellow students, another had been the target of students shouting, “Get in my oven” and “Heil Hitler”, and yet another was reportedly threatened with a knife in a school bathroom.

The independent inquiry was commissioned by the Victorian Department of Education and Training, and concluded with eighteen recommendations for the school alongside a plan, with the Jewish Community Council of Victoria, to improve understandings of the specific nature and manifestations of antisemitism. This will be made available to all educators and teaching staff in the Australian state.

The BSC principal has welcomed the recommendations, pledging to introduce an online form for students to report antisemitic behaviour and incidents and committing to the ongoing monitoring of all school facilities to prevent hateful graffiti and to guarantee its immediate removal. Following the report, the school is holding a prompt review of school policies that will broaden the definition of racial harassment to include religious vilification and discrimination.

However, legal representatives of the parents of the young victims have expressed regret that the report failed to hold the current leadership of the school to account. In a public statement it was argued that the families do not believe the findings acknowledge the experiences of those affected, with many students fearing a hostile environment and suffering “genuine distress” as a consequence. The majority of Jewish students impacted had to leave BSC due to rising levels of antisemitism within the institution and the failure of the college to protect their safety and mental wellbeing.

As a result, families are reportedly seeking to continue the fight for justice for their children.

Campaign Against Antisemitism has expanded our coverage of antisemitism worldwide. Please contact us if you would like to share feedback or volunteer to assist with this project.

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Campaign Against Antisemitism is a volunteer-led charity dedicated to exposing and countering antisemitism through education and zero-tolerance enforcement of the law. Everything that we do is done by people who volunteer their time, using donations contributed by members of the public. Join the fight against antisemitism by subscribing to our updates, volunteering, or donating.