California has become the first state in the country to adopt an ethnic studies curriculum for its high schools, but the history of Palestine has been scrubbed from the educational program.
On Thursday, California State Board of Education voted unanimously to approve the curriculum. “We are reminded daily that racism is not only a legacy of the past but a clear and present danger,” said the board’s president Linda Darling-Hammond. “We must understand this history if we are finally to end it.”
In 2019, the bill was held up after some claimed the program singled out Israel and failed to adequately address antisemitism. The backlash was fueled by right-wing, pro-Israel groups and the app Act.IL (which is partially funded by the Israeli government) called on its users to oppose its implentation.
The anger was in reaction to a Arab American Studies course, which had been drafted by the state’s Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum Advisory Committee. The course noted the community’s underrepresentation in media and defined the BDS movement for students.
BDS is “a global social movement that currently aims to establish freedom for Palestinians living under apartheid conditions,” the draft explained. “Inspired by tactics employed during the South African anti-apartheid movement, the Palestinian-led movement calls for the boycott, divestment, and sanctioning of the Israeli government until it complies with International law.”
This definition was vociferously attacked by groups like Stand With Us (an organization that denies the West Bank is even being occupied), who called for the state’s education department to be flooded with comments opposing its inclusion. “The State of California is currently reviewing a model Ethnic Studies curriculum, which openly promotes hateful boycotts against Israel and omits antisemitism as a form of bigotry,” read an alert that the group put out. “We especially encourage parents, high school students, and educators to comment and share how this model curriculum will impact them personally.”
The board ended up bowing to the pressure and modified the program. California Governor Gavin Newsom even apologized for the language of the original draft.
Educator Jody Sokolower explained what happened next on our site last month:
The California Department of Education disbanded the original advisory committee and the Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum (ESMC) was revised under a cloak of secrecy — they refused to release the names of the consultants or the writers in charge of the revisions. They did, however, continue to meet with pro-Israel lobbyists. Media headlines targeted the ESMC’s mention of BDS (the movement to boycott, divest from, and sanction Israel for its human rights violations against Palestinians) in a list of social movements students might want to research. But, in fact, the pro-Israel lobby’s opposition extended to any mention of Palestine or acknowledgment of Arab American studies as integral to ethnic studies.
Arab American, Asian American, and other ethnic studies educators, students, and community members started organizing to defend the ESMC. University faculty joined forces with K–12 teachers and community activists to enlist support and public comment. The Association for Asian American Studies, the Arab American Studies Association, Black Lives Matter, Jewish Voice for Peace, veterans of the 1968 strikes, and internationally recognized scholars — including Angela Davis and Robin D. G. Kelley — all came out in support of the ESMC. Progressive Jewish educators and activists made it clear that the pro-Israel lobby does not speak for them.
These demands were completely ignored. The version of the curriculum that was just adopted omits any mention of Palestine at all. Neoconservative New York Times columnist Bret Stephens lamented the adoption of ethnic studies overall, but applauded the moves. “At least the anti-Semitic and anti-Zionist dog whistles have been taken out,” he wrote.
The Arab Resource and Organizing Center (AROC) sent out an email denouncing the current program as “whitewashed” and “anti-Palestinian.” “Today CDE has put on a production to mask the mass opposition to this curriculum,” said AROC Executive Director Lara Kiswani in a statement. “They have continued to center whiteness, allowing white right-wing interest groups to shape a curriculum intended on eradicating racism.”
Orwell could have included the California State Board of Education in his novel “1984”. Their statement, “We must understand this history” would fit right in as a doomsday line. Or it could be a hilarious line in an SNL skit.
There’s also a new initiative/website, School Watch, to help with the “scrubbing” at the schools.
One hopes that the California board of education pays a visit to the great mondo forum to enhance the curriculum. Here they can learn that Jewish is a religion based identity (identities have “bases”, the Jewish people is an illusion); that the Palestinians are a 15,000 year old tribe who are also the Jebusites from the Bible. Except for the Mufti who descended from Mohammad. Such later people as the Assyrians, the Jews, Greeks, Romans and others evidently didn’t disturb the genetic purity of the Jebisites who remained especially fertile; that the Florida Jews, a whole 1/4 percent of the population defy math and are obviously the most powerful block in the population, negating the votes of the other 99 3/4 percent; the Jews are slavo Turks and ibero berbers (a Slav meets a Turk and the rest is history) and so many other gems. Imagine what the children of California are missing…
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https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/nora-barrows-friedman/israel-lobby-loses-legal-effort-harass-palestinian-rights-activists
“Israel lobby loses legal effort to harass Palestinian rights activists”
The Electronic Intifada, Mar.19/21, by Nora-Barrows Friedman
EXCERPT:
“In a major victory for privacy and free speech on college campuses, a California judge has ruled against demands by an anti-Palestinian litigant to be able to harass human rights activists.
“It marks the first time that a US court ‘has acknowledged the McCarthyite environment faced by those speaking out for Palestinian rights,’ according to civil rights group Palestine Legal, which represented eight defendants, along with the Asian Law Caucus and attorney Matthew Strugar.
“For nearly three years, David Abrams had targeted and threatened the University of California at Los Angeles over a 2018 National Students for Justice in Palestine conference that was held on campus.”Abrams’ lawsuit demanded that UCLA release the names of the speakers at the private event, after the university denied in 2019 his request to disclose the names.
“On 11 March, the court rejected those demands and ruled that disclosure of the speakers’ names was not in the public interest and ‘would violate their rights to freedom of association, anonymous speech, and privacy.’
“The court acknowledged ‘harassment, job difficulties, and problems entering Israel emanating generally from pro-Palestinian activism,’ recognizing that it was in the public interest in not disclosing the speaker’s names ‘to protect their privacy and avoid a chilling effect from their speech.’
“The decision ‘rejects the notion that students lose their constitutional rights when advocating for the rights of Palestinians at a public university,’ Palestine Legal stated.
“Abrams has a lengthy history of filing legal complaints against groups who support the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaign for Palestinian rights.
“Abrams’ lawfare firm, the Zionist Advocacy Center, is a registered foreign agent for the International Legal Forum, which is funded by and works for the Israeli government to target BDS campaigners.
(cont’d)
Mr. Stephens the supremacist says: Ethnic studies: Bad.
Mr. Stephens the Jewish / “Jewish State” supremacist (Zionist) says: Ethnic studies with no mention of the past and on-going victims of Zionism: Good.