By Karyn Pomerantz, April 9, 2024
Introduction
Education has a powerful influence in our lives. It prepares students to become workers, parents, and soldiers. It indoctrinates us with a country’s values and history. For example, every country teaches an “origin” story of its founding. The US presents its Pilgrims benevolently breaking bread with Native American tribes; Israel celebrates its founding as “a land without people for a people without land.” These stories present the conquest of lands as normal and justified, whether the West Bank or the Wild West. They are strongly ingrained and difficult to unlearn. Education can also liberate workers from stereotypes and distorted histories.
This article presents the ways capitalist, specifically Zionist, education pushes capitalist lies and racism, and the repression of educators who resist. It begins with a struggle of public-school teachers in Maryland, other examples of repression, and the role of racism in curriculum. It ends with visions of education under communism.
Maryland Teachers Fight Back
In late 2023, the School Boards of Montgomery and Anne Arundel Counties, MD suspended five teachers charging them with antisemitism for opposing genocide in Gaza. The teachers responded by building a coalition of educators and supporters called Solidarity, Not Silence. Along with the Palestinian Youth Movement, JVP, and the communist Progressive Labor Party (PLP) the teachers developed fliers, a ceasefire petition, a resolution, rallies, and protests at School Board meetings.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rx_mqSky5Mo
Some community groups chose to try to convince politicians to call for a ceasefire or to get residents to vote “uncommitted,” but they ignored the fascist attacks in their schools. The PLP worked to defend teachers and professors, to explain the underlying reasons for the school system’s repressive tactics, and to build a grassroots movement to fight repression in the schools. In that vein, members and friends attended Montgomery County Education Association (MCEA) union meetings to submit a resolution for a ceasefire. Zionist groups led by the Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) (Annual Report, 2023) pressured the union leadership to call the resolution “out of order” since it addressed a global issue, not a local education problem!
Teachers and their supporters attended the packed MCEA meeting in March to present the resolution. The MCEA vice-president denied them the chance to present it causing some to walk out in disgust. Others waited for hours until the open mic time allowed them to make comments.
The author of the resolution read the entire text to the audience, concluding that:
“We are anti-racist teachers and if we are trying to fight racism-not just in our town, county, state, or country, we must be international and unite: Arab, Jewish, Black, White, and Latin must unite and be one to fight racism.”
The Council on Islamic Relations (CAIR), an ally of the teachers, also countered the JCRC:
“MCEA’s ceasefire resolution is important precisely because all students in Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) deserve to thrive – including Palestinian-American children whose loved ones have been killed or forcibly displaced in the relentless carpet-bombing of Gaza funded by billions of our tax dollars. …
MCPS educators also deserve to thrive, including those who’ve been unjustly reprimanded for simply advocating for their basic human rights. The educational system in Gaza has been decimated. Children there have not attended school since October. Advocating for all students is an important part of being an educator. The tax dollars our government spends to prolong this deadly violence are put to better use by investing in our own schools and towns. Anyone who fails to understand this is out of touch with humanity (CAIR. March 2024).”
The JCRC is a serious opponent. It charged the teachers with antisemitism using the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA, 2016) definition that contends that any statement against Zionism and Israel is antisemitic. People are antisemitic if they:
- Accuse Jews of being more loyal to Israel than their home countries.
- Call Israel a “racist endeavor.”
- Compare Israel’s policies to Nazism. (IHRA)”.
If JCRC is not effective in blocking criticism of Israel, there are organized fascist thugs ready to roll as this video reveals. This is a video from a pro Israeli group.
(Zionist protestor in Rockville, MD, November 2023. https://twitter.com/RamyYaacoub/status/1723075975183761431).
Repression of Education Workers Against Genocide in Gaza
There has been widespread repression against educators who speak out against the war on Palestinian workers. Palestine Legal reported in February 2024 that they received over 1300 requests for help since October 7 (Palestine Legal).
The worst attack on education occurs in Gaza where the Israeli armed forces, the IDF, have committed “scholasticide” by bombing all the universities and 76% of the school buildings. The IDF also targeted and killed Refaat Alareer, the esteemed professor and poet at the Islamic University. Over 100 other academics and thousands of school children and staff have died in Israeli attacks (Truthout, April 9, 2024).
University administrations have fired and threatened professors and physicians. They banned activist groups, such as Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace. The City University of New York, CUNY, retaliated against two adjunct professors, Danny Shaw and Hoffman-Kuroda, for expressing their support for Palestinians. The president at a Maryland community college threatened a professor for sponsoring talks on Palestinian history and solidarity between Palestinian and African liberation struggles.
Medical and health associations, including the American Medical Association, rejected resolutions for a ceasefire, claiming they were extraneous to their missions. In France, the police raided a doctor’s home and jailed him, and in New York, a doctor lost his residency. The University of Ottawa suspended a family physician over his social media posts supportive of Palestinian so-called rights. He resigned from the Board of the Canadian Medical Association, citing the group’s refusal to take a stance “in the face of ongoing Israeli apartheid and genocide.”
These attacks, including harsh police violence at demonstrations, are increasing as resistance grows. While we defend these courageous activists, we must focus on the primary problem: the imperialist lust by the US and Israel over the area’s oil and gas fields, and its strategic location.
As the antigenocide scholar William Robinson writes:
“Now is the time for social justice activists to step up their resistance. The Israeli government would not have bothered to develop its action plan were the mass movement not having a mounting impact on the U.S. and the world stage in turning the political tide against the genocidists. The action plan makes clear that wresting the public narrative from these genocidists and their Western backers is as important as the balance of forces in the streets. At stake, along with the defense of Palestinian lives, is the very existence of academic freedom and free speech.”
There is only freedom of speech for the ruling class, those who have the power to shape the mass messages we learn in school and through the media (Truthout).
Capitalist Curricula Promote War and Racism
Curricula, especially those that deal with gender, immigration status, racial categorization, and sexuality, become components of the culture wars used to divide and bias workers. Textbooks and movies inculcate racist stereotypes of the “enemy” so that soldiers can kill with impunity and the public can justify genocide.
Nurit Peled-Elhanen, a Palestinian professor at Hebrew University, describes how Israeli instruction dehumanizes Palestinians by depicting them all as antisemitic and terrorists. She describes how Israeli educators use the Holocaust to rationalize violence against Palestinians although they had nothing to do with the genocide of Jews.
Some examples from Israeli curriculum reveal the lies embedded in student minds from an early age. She shows how Israeli students are “educated in fear” and how their instruction:
- Portrays Arabs as backward, traditional, and selfish.
- Describes Palestinians as a security threat and as a minority.
- Blames the victims of the Nakba because residents didn’t heed warnings to evacuate in 1948.
- Imposes “geographic silence” with maps and photos that don’t show Palestinian homes or people.
(Peled-Elhanen, Nurit, 2012, 2023, 2024).
Libraries are another battleground over censorship and repression. White Christian Nationalists recommended most of the books to ban. The American Library Association (ALA) reported that libraries banned 4240 books in 2023, a 65% increase over 2022, thus denying access to books that reflect the lives and resilience of marginalized people (Truthout).
Overall, there are few popular, non-academic materials about working-class rebellions, revolutions, or multiracial organizing. There are few accurate popular documentaries of imperialist plunder of African countries, the installation of dictators in Latin America, or the exploitation of Haitian labor. Rather, ruling class educators flood curricula with ideas of anti-communism, white superiority, and the permanence of the status quo.
What Can We Do?
In response, the number of antiracists must increase to weaken developing fascist movements. Otherwise, we can end up weak and divided like European workers experienced under fascist regimes in Spain, Italy, and Germany during the 1930s and WWII.
We can explore and share different tools to resist attacks on teaching about Palestine. The Health Workers Alliance for Palestine (HAP) published Guidance for Those Facing Intimidation and Harassment, and Rothchild and Murad published the Toolkit to Defend K-12 Educators and Librarians Against False Accusations of Antisemitism.
The Toolkit describes how to recognize antisemitism, especially when it is equated with any criticism of Israel. It strongly advises speaking out and not surrendering to self-censorship. It recommends that teachers also speak up for the oppression of other groups and to link to broader struggles. Included are appendices of resources for help (Toolkit).
Other ways to resist censorship and build support for Palestinians:
- Join mass movements against imperialism, racism, antisemitism, and Zionism, such as Health Workers Alliance for Palestine, Students for Justice in Palestine, and Jewish Voice for Peace.
- Reject self-censorship and identity politics-be bold and speak up for all oppressed groups.
- Oppose education that promotes racist ideas, such as the existence of immutable biological differences between groups.
- Organize grassroots campaigns instead of relying on politicians.
- Become a real friend of your library and support antiracist collections.
- Build and join a revolutionary, multiracial organization to organize a communist society.
What Do We Want?
Ultimately, we can replace a system of exploitation, capitalism, with a system run collectively by the working class, communism.
Communist education would include histories of working-class movements and instructional materials that promote international solidarity, not nationalism. There would be high-quality universal education for people of all ages, small class sizes, experiential (hands-on) learning, health and science curricula, literacy training, art instruction, time for parental involvement, health services, and support for people with disabilities and mental illnesses. There would be no tracks based on “race” or gender. Healthier social conditions like housing and food would enable learning.
Most importantly, there would be political discussions about creating a more egalitarian world and collective decisions about educational policy and practices.
Further Reading and Listening
Toolkits and Advice
Zinn Education Project. Teaching About Palestine-Israel and the Unfolding Genocide in Gaza, March 1, 2024. https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/teaching-palestine-israel
This is a large compilation of teaching materials for students of all ages.
Rothchild A. Murad N. Toolkit to Defend K-12 Educators and Librarians Against False Accusations of Antisemitism. https://idainthemiddle.com/teaching-resources/toolkit-to-defend-k-12-educators-librarians-against-false-accusations-of-antisemitism/
Faculty First-Responders. Understanding Right Wing Attacks on Faculty.
Health Workers Alliance for Palestine (HAP) Guidance. https://healthworkersforpalestine.org/
Other References
Nurit Peled-Elhanan writes about anti-Palestinian racism and education in Israel.
Holocaust Education and the Semiotics of Othering in Israeli Schoolbooks, 2023.
Palestine in Israeli School Books: Ideology and Propaganda in Education, 2012.
Interview with the Palestine Museum, Winter 2024, 1 hour.
Truthout. (https://www.truthout.org/) https://truthout.org/articles/over-1600-academics-sign-letter-condemning-israels-scholasticide-in-gaza/
American Library Association. https://www.ala.org
Banned Books, Resources.https://bannedbooksweek.org/resources https://bannedbooksweek.org/resources/
Jewish Voice for Peace. (https://www.jvp.org)
Publishers for Palestine. https://publishersforpalestine.org/2024/02/09/report-censorship-of-solidarity-with-palestine/
Notes that publishers stopped reprinting Ilan Pappe’s Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine!
Sales, B. The IHIRA definition of antisemitism and why people are fighting over it, explained it-explained. March 2015. https://www.jta.org/2021/01/15/global/the-ihra-definition-of-anti-semitism-and-why-people-are-fighting-over-it-explained
Legal help if you are punished for speaking out:
Palestine Legal. https://palestine.org
CAIR. https://www.cair.org
ACLU: https://www.aclu.org
Center for Constitutional Rights, CCR. https://ccrjustice.org/
Banned Books https://bannedbooks.org
American Library Association’s Intellectual Freedom Office of Intellectual Freedom. https://www.ala.org
The Multiracial Unity Blog 
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