Welcome to the United States, where anti-Israel indoctrination masquerades as 'critical thinking'
Greetings to all of you from Boston (yes, again).
I am starting today's posting with a local story - from my home town.
Indoctrination @ Newton, a new video released today by Americans for Peace and Tolerance (APT), exposes a pattern of anti-Israel teachings found in Newton, Massachusetts high schools, including:
Newton’s high schools have used Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) maps that falsify the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Newton students were not told that the maps were created by the PLO’s propaganda unit.
Newton’s schools presented students with a falsified version of the Hamas Charter. In Newton’s doctored version the word ”Jews” – as a target of hatred -- is replaced with the word “Zionists.”
In one lesson, Newton students are asked to consider the Jewish state’s right to exist. (The legitimacy of no other nation-state’s existence is questioned.) The lesson included “expert” opinions, which are drawn overwhelmingly from anti-Israel academics and anti-Semitic activists.
A book used in Newton high schools has a recommended reading list that includes the extremist writings by Muslim Brotherhood leaders including Sayyid Qutb, and Yusuf Qaradawi, whose sermons call for the murder of Jews and homosexuals.
Newton schools officials are shown to continuously refuse to make school curricula and teaching materials available to the Newton residents.
Charles Jacobs, APT President said, “The video also shows that Saudi, Palestinian, and other Arab-funded teaching materials have been inserted into the curriculum, much of it containing anti-Israel bias.”
The Saudi funded Arab World Studies Notebook was used in Newton high schools until public pressure forced its removal. The Notebook, condemned by the American Jewish Committee (AJC), and rejected by many other school boards, teaches students, among other things, that Israeli soldiers murder Palestinian women. Newton’s Superintendent of Schools David Fleishman claimed that use of the Notebook helps develop “critical thinking skills.”
The video’s release follows news reports of anti-Semitic incidents, including hateful graffiti found in Newton North High School and at the F.A. Day Middle School. The graffiti featured swastikas and the genocidal statement “Burn the Jews.” According to media reports, Newton Day school officials – in violation of required mandatory reporting procedures – failed to inform parents and police about the incidents. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) expressed concerns about these escalating anti-Semitic incidents.
Upon discovering racist graffiti at Boston Latin High School, city, state, and federal agencies immediately launched an investigation into the matter. Jacobs said, “Concerned parents in Newton demand equal protection for Jewish students. Accordingly, in light of Newton’s biased education, its ongoing refusal to allow public access to curricula and teaching materials, and the recent escalation of anti-Semitism, we urge Newton Mayor Setti Warren, Massachusetts’ state education officials, and the FBI to investigate this hateful situation in Newton schools.”
Let's go to the videotape. More after the video.
As many of you know, I grew up in Newton - about a 5-minute walk from Newton North High School. I did not attend the Newton public schools. Newton was and is a heavily Jewish suburb of Boston and both Newton North and Newton South have many Jewish students. Some of you may have heard of this alumna of Newton North. One can only wonder how much influence the Newton public schools had on her political views.
School Retaliates Against Student For Parent’s Pro-Israel Stance
Received via email earlier today:
1-29-15
A state education department found that a school district and
School Committee Chair retaliated against a student because of her parent’s
complaint about inaccurate and biased materials.
The decision by the Massachusetts
agency found that the Newton Public Schools (NPS) and School
Committee Chair
Matthew Hills
sent confidential information about the student and her family to local media,
which published it. The media entities - a newspaper and a blog - also
published false claims that the parent was associated with anti-Muslim groups.
The student’s family said that both the newspaper and blog
knew that the family had previously been stalked and that publishing the false
allegations put them in danger. They also stated they suffered emotional
distress and other harm due to the district’s actions.
Parents and education groups have accused the school of
distributing inaccurate and anti-Israel material, resulting in the removal of
several widely used resources. One resource, the Arab World Studies Notebook,
has been been subject to intense criticism by education groups and removed from
other school districts. The district also removed a website and whited out a
textbook’s claim that the Catholic church was “reconsidering polygamy as a
Christian option”.
Parents’ complaint are supported by organizations including
the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA),
Scholars for Peace in the Middle East,
StandWithUs, and Zionist Organization of America.
Last September, the education research organization Verity
Educate issued a report on materials used in NPS history classes. The report
found numerous inaccurate and deceptive material, including altered primary source
documents. It also found substantial anti-Israel bias, including material
described as ‘neutral’ which had been prepared by anti-Israel activists.
The district denies that any bias or inaccuracies exist.
Officials also told parents that they would ‘never’ read the report issued by
Verity Educate or any other organization and that parents upset about deceptive
or racist class material “should find another school for their children”.
“The retaliation by school officials against a child because
of a parent’s legitimate complaints about biased and deceptive class materials
is outrageous”, said Evan Jacobi, president of the group Parents for Excellence
in Newton Schools (PENS). “Their goal is to further intimidate parents who object to their children being
told that biased and grossly inaccurate material is true.”
Hills was also found to have violated state Open Meeting law
several times in 2014 in an attempt to cover up a plagarized speech given by
Newton Superintendent David Fleishman, and advised Fleishman and others to
violate state and federal law by withholding documents from responses to public
records requests. No sanctions have been imposed on Hills for these violations.
What the Newton public schools pro-'Palestinian' education has brought
There's a lot of outrage over this report about the public schools in Newton, Mass., the town in which I grew up.
Parents groups are up in arms after a recent report found public
schools in Newton, Massachusetts presented whitewashed versions of Hamas
and Palestinian Authority (PA) charters, as well as other materials
posing the destruction of Israel as acceptable.
The findings were made through an investigation of classroom materials by the independent watchdog group Verity Educate, which discovered "repeated
instances of bias against Israel, bias against the US and its actions
in the Middle East, and bias that sanitizes the ideology and actions of
terrorists."
Parents for Excellence in Newton Schools (PENS), which took part in
the research, on Sunday released a statement demanding action over the
issue and detailing just how serious the school materials were.
In one case, students were given a modified version of the Hamas
charter, in which references to genocide were removed and the word "Jew"
was replaced with "Israeli" to sanitize the terrorist group's murderous
intentions.
Boston Jewish leadership's credibility attacked in Newton school text dispute
I've discussed the curriculum in the Newton, Massachusetts public high schools several times, most recently here. As some of you might recall, I grew up in Newton, although I did not attend the Newton public schools.
The New English Review reports that the integrity of several Boston Jewish communal organizations has come under attack for their refusal to condemn the use in Newton's high school of two texts deemed anti-Israel and anti-Semitic.
Questions on the integrity of Boston Jewish communal groups, the regional office of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), Combined Jewish Philanthropies (CJP) and its affiliate, the Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) were raised in a Boston Jewish newspaper report released this week. The investigation was prompted by a raging dispute with Americans for Peace and Tolerance (APT) over the Newton, Massachusetts School Board use of controversial anti-Israel and Muslim proselytizing high school texts.
The Boston Jewish Advocate (The Advocate), the
weekly Jewish community newspaper of record, has published an
investigation of this latest development in an 18 month battle brought
to the community’s attention by Dr. Charles Jacobs and his team at
Americans for Peace and Tolerance (APT), “ADL, CJP Newton reaction raises questions of integrity”. We posted on The Iconoclast
about this simmering dispute in late October 2013, when Jacobs and APT
took out ads in several local and regional newspapers. These were about
the troubling world history course texts used by the Newton School
Board in 9th and 10th grades; “The Arab World Studies Notebook” and “A Muslim Primer”.
The Advocate’s expose was triggered by a November 15, 2013
letter signed by the heads of the regional ADL, the CJP and its
affiliate, the JCRC, published in the newspaper, alleging that they had
conducted their own investigation on the troubling Newton school board
texts. This letter was prompted by another ad by the APT pointing out
the lack of attention by the local Jewish defense and Federation groups
to anti-Israel maps from the controversial texts similar to those that
ran on bus kiosks and in subways of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation
Authority (MBTA). The Advocate expose noted:
Controversy continues to swirl over a
statement released by the ADL, CJP and JCRC claiming that charges by APT
President Charles Jacobs of anti-Israel material in the Newton Public
Schools were groundless.
Following that statement and ambiguity over whether a referenced ADL report
even existed, the JCRC stated that it has also conducted an inquiry into
alleged anti-Israel materials taught in 9th- and 10th-grade history classes
in the Newton Public Schools that is separate from that of the Anti-
Defamation League (ADL).
However, the JCRC – like the ADL before it – declined to share the details
of their review with the public, prompting some in the community –
including an instructor at Brandeis University in Waltham – to raise the
question of transparency in local Jewish organizations.
We have reported in New English Review articles, interviews and Iconoclast
posts on the local Boston regional and national investigations by the
APT. In particular we have drawn attention to the nearly decade long
battle to uncover the support and indoctrination in terrorism by the
Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center (ISBCC) controlled by an
affiliate of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Muslim American Society.. The
ISBCC figured prominently in the incitement of the Boston Marathon jihad bombers, the refugee Tsarneav brothers.
...
Once again, Jacobs and the APT team as well as independent
investigators have caught the Boston Jewish community leaders in a web
of deception abetting anti-Israelism in both the local schools and in
the public debate. This does not come as a surprise to us, nor is it an
isolated case. For example, we can point to our investigations of the
controversial Olive Tree Initiative at UCAL Irvine funded by an affiliate of the local Orange County, California Jewish Federation.
How can we trust the Boston Jewish leaders to defend both Israel and the Jewish people?
It should be noted that the American Jewish Congress (AJC) has urged schools across the United States not to use the Arab World Studies Notebook.
As you might imagine, Newton's schools are very heavily Jewish....
Why have Newton students been "learning" from textbooks that demonize Israel and America while glorifying Islam?
Why have Newton students been "learning" from textbooks that demonize Israel and America while glorifying Islam? Good question (Hat Tip: Lance K).
For over a year local Newton parents and tax-payers have been trying to get the Newton School Committee to stop using religiously and ethnically biased materials in the classrooms. These materials, which are provided to the schools by extremist advocacy groups with a political agenda, promote anti-Western, and anti-Jewish propaganda while verging on proselytizing for Islam.
The School Committee has circled the wagons, and is refusing to conduct an open investigation. Officials told staff not to let citizens see the offending materials and tried to charge parents thousands of dollars just to see what their children are learning.
The schools claim to have removed one problematic text, which claimed that Jews torture Arab women in Israeli jails. Yet they have refused to go back into the classroom and tell students that they’ve been taught propaganda. Since then, students have brought to our attention many more examples of hateful and false materials being taught. Over the next few days, we will be compiling them on
Tony Pagliuso told the Newton TAB his daughter, a Newton South High School student, was given material defaming Israeli defense forces.
Pagliuso said World History teacher Jessica Engel distributed a chapter on women from the Arab World Notebook to students earlier this week.
“It’s pure propaganda and pure defamation that Israeli occupation forces and citizen soldiers are imprisoning, torturing and murdering Arab women,” he said.
The section, of the third of five pages, reads as follows: “Over the past four decades, women have been active in the Palestinian resistance movement. Several hundred have been imprisoned, tortured, and killed by Israeli occupation forces since the latest uprising, “Intifada,” in the Israeli occupied territories.”
Pagliuso said his daughter was troubled by the reading.
“My family - we’re all Israeli and American citizens and have a lot of family in this area. [My daughter] said ‘is this true? Is this what Israeli soldiers do?’ knowing full well we have 25 family members in the Israel Defense Forces,” he said.
Pagliuso said he spoke to Engel, Department Head Jennifer Morrill, Principal Joel Stembridge, central administrators and Mayor Setti Warren.
Superintendant David Fleishman said Stembridge, Morrill and Engel are meeting with Pagliuso on Tuesday.
“Jen Morrill is in her first month of the job. She took a look at it and agreed it’s something that needs to be reviewed… I took a look at it and agree it needs to be reviewed,” Fleishman said.
He said they’ll examine the particular passage to see is it fits with the goal of the class-learning about Islam and women in the Middle East.
He said the previous department head was involved in the curriculum choice, and that administrators will determine if it deviates from the class’ goal.
“We value lots of input and free speech, and we agreed with the parent it's worth reviewing,” he said.
A cop out: Blame the prior administration.
Of course the real question is where are Israel's representatives in the Boston area and why aren't they countering this type of propaganda? Silly me. Why even ask that question?
By the way, there was a four-hour break in the middle of this post. Yours truly is not feeling well (I sent my young sons to tonight's Simchat Beit HaShoeva celebrations with someone else). God willing, this too will pass.
I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com
