Well, perhaps not official policy, but when you’re the boss, what you say generally has a similar impact. The matter in question takes place at MS 136, a public middle school in Brooklyn, New York. The principal there, Amanda Bueno, had been following the news of the latest outbreak of missile attacks against Israel and that nation’s response against Hamas. She grew so distressed that she decided to send out an all-hands memo to the staff informing them that the Palestinians desperately needed their support against their Israeli oppressors and proceeded to list a variety of ways that all of the recipients could proceed to do so. This official announcement obviously didn’t sit well with everyone, particularly some of the Jewish teachers at the school. And it was quickly pointed out that what she had done was actually against the law in New York. (NY Post)
In an email sent amid the since-suspended fighting between Israel and Hamas terrorists, Principal Amanda Bueno told staffers at MS 136, “If you have been watching the news in absolute horror, you are not alone.”
“You can take action today by protesting, attending a vigil, making a public commitment to Palestinian Liberation, signing a petition, or calling your government officials to place sanctions on Isreal (sic),” she wrote Wednesday morning.
“The time is now to take a stand for those impacted by state-sanctioned violence and crimes against the humanity of the most vulnerable in our world.”
The email included a list of links to resources of interest to those seeking to help the Palestinians battle Israel. One pointed to an article where Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) was favorably quoted condemning Israel for defending itself. She also urged the staff to contact their elected officials and push them to impose sanctions on Israel, though it appears that she doesn’t even know how to spell Israel. (This woman is a school principal. Doesn’t she at least have a spell checker?)
One Jewish teacher reached out to the Post and said, “I felt very targeted and very attacked by her words.” Normally we leave the “targeting” talk to liberals, but if they can do it, so can this teacher I suppose. In this case, it might be literally true, though. There have already been reported incidents of people sporting Palestinian flags physically attacking Jews not very far from this school.
As already mentioned, what Principal Bueno was doing appears to be against the law. This is an issue that was quickly pointed out to the city’s Department of Education.
Lawyer Inna Vernikov — a former staffer for then-Assemblyman Dov Hikind (D-Brooklyn), an outspoken supporter of Israel — also sent a letter to the DOE calling for Bueno to be reprimanded.
“New York law forbids requesting or encouraging any public servant, city employee, or subordinate public servant/employee to engage in political activities,” she wrote.
You are not allowed to use your position in the public school system or your school-owned communication channels to try to influence the political decisions and voices of other public servants and employees. I’m sure that rule gets broken all of the time without anyone noticing, but this was rather egregious.
There’s one other thing to point out in closing. Since we’re talking about New York City here, I doubt many of you are terribly surprised to hear this. But this woman runs the activities of a large school. Her influence no doubt carries over to much of the staff. What sort of indoctrination of middle school students do you suppose is going on in her classrooms? Is she just raising up another generation of antisemites?
