Jewish parents slam Pennsylvania school over keffiyah handout event

FIRST ON FOX: A Pennsylvania college district is dealing with backlash from Jewish mother and father after a Muslim scholar membership that promoted Palestinians handed out keffiyahs to college students, confirmed pictures criticizing Israel and targeted extra on activism than tradition, mother and father say.

“My baby got here residence shocked and uncertain if it was protected to talk as a Jew in school,” Lynn Simon, a Wissahickon Faculty District father or mother, instructed Fox Information Digital about Monday’s occasion at Wissahickon Excessive Faculty, the place scholar golf equipment gave displays at an annual tradition truthful sales space with cubicles representing totally different cultures. including a stand from the chapter Muslim College students of America.

The district’s superintendent, Dr. Mwenyewe Dawan, is seen in photographs on Instagram with Assistant Superintendent Sean Gardiner. The varsity’s director, Dr. Lynne Blair, posted photographs of the occasion on her official college social media account, however has since deleted a number of the photographs.

Appalled mother and father say some college students displayed slogans reminiscent of “Jerusalem is ours,” handed out money prizes, inspired directors and younger college students to don keffiyehs, and truly engaged in pro-Palestinian activism on college grounds.

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Jewish mother and father from Wissahickon Excessive Faculty outdoors Philadelphia argued with a Muslim scholar sales space final week. (WikiCommons)

“When the principal posts photographs of scholars sporting slogans like ‘Jerusalem is ours,’ and the chief inspector encourages unlawful playing led by minors, visiting and taking photographs of politically charged stalls that gown college students in keffiyehs, that is not training — it is indoctrination. We do not ship our youngsters to high school to be marginalized. We demand accountability, not photograph ops.”

Fox Information Digital reached out to the Wissahickon Faculty District a number of occasions and acquired no response.

Steve Rosenberg, director of the North American Values ​​Institute in Philadelphia, instructed Fox Information Digital that “the Wissahickon administration continues to set the gold customary for training malpractice.”

“The blurring of the traces between tradition and radical political propaganda — facilitated by workers, celebrated by management, and normalized for college kids — is each a disgrace and a warning signal. Faculty needs to be a spot for essential pondering, not cultural intimidation and performative activism masquerading as range. The district owes its college students higher.”

A letter despatched to the varsity by dozens of Jewish mother and father, obtained by Fox Information Digital, additional outlines issues concerning the occasion, saying their youngsters witnessed a number of issues that “crossed clear academic and moral boundaries.”

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Protesters collect in Washington, DC, for the No Kings protest on October 18, 2025. (Emma Woodhead/Fox Information Digital)

“College students visiting the Muslim Scholar Affiliation sales space have been inspired to put on keffiyehs, an emblem that within the present international local weather is broadly related not solely with cultural heritage, but in addition with political actions, hostility towards Israel, and in lots of contexts, overt expressions of anti-Jewish sentiment,” stated the letter, despatched to Superintendent Dawan.

“A number of college students reported spending time on the Muslim Scholar Affiliation desk and never stopping the intimidating and inappropriate habits. For a lot of Jewish college students, this was not perceived as a cultural gesture – it was perceived as a political sign from the best authority within the district.”

What was “extra disturbing,” the mother and father defined, was that cash and sweet have been being handed out in alternate for interacting with the sales space actions.

The letter reads: “The usage of monetary or materials incentives to interact college students in a politically charged show is inappropriate and coercive. It exploits college students’ curiosity and social strain, turning an academic surroundings into one by which sure political identities are rewarded and implicitly sanctioned by district leaders.”

The photographs posted by Blair have been described within the letter as “much more alarming,” and the slogan “Jerusalem is ours” was described as one which goes past a “cultural assertion” however somewhat a “political declare that denies Jewish historical past, id and connection to Israel’s capital.”

“It is a message that’s typically utilized in extremist and anti-normalization actions,” the mother and father say within the letter. “For a college chief to publicly endorse these pictures, even not directly, is deeply inappropriate and sends a chilling message to Jewish college students: your historical past and id are being challenged right here, and people in authority are comfy empowering those that problem them.”

In a single board meeting on December 1, the MSA chapter president defended the time period, saying it isn’t “inherently anti-Semitic.”

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A statue of George Washington tied with a Palestinian flag and a keffiyeh at George Washington College in Washington, DC, on Might 2, 2024. (Craig Hudson/Reuters)

“Jerusalem is at present a battle space the place two events are literally combating,” the scholar stated. “That assertion was written in Arabic, so not one of the Jewish college students may truly perceive that and take it as anti-Semitic, in order that’s actually simply one thing a person says to tear us down and painting us as anti-Semitic. That truly goes towards my earlier level that anti-Semitism shouldn’t be watered down. We should not use that time period frivolously right here and there.”

The mother and father within the letter name on the varsity to take 5 actions in response to their issues, together with offering a public rationalization of the district’s involvement in distributing the keffiyehs and addressing the principal’s social media publish that amplifies the controversial message.

Moreover, the letter requires the discharge of the “planning framework” for the occasion, together with how cubicles have been authorised.

The mother and father are additionally asking for “clear district tips” detailing how to make sure cultural programming doesn’t veer into “political advocacy” and the way all teams, together with Jewish college students, will probably be protected against “harassment.”

Lastly, the mother and father ask for a ‘listening session’ by which Jewish households and college students can discuss concerning the affect the stalls have had on them.

“Faculties should be protected, impartial areas the place college students of all identities are revered,” the letter concludes. “What occurred this week undermines that precept, and it has created actual concern amongst Jewish college students who now wonder if their district will shield them — or go away them alone on this local weather.”