In a June 18 press release The Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles announced that they are part of a joint effort with several organization to form a coalition fighting antisemitism in Los Angeles schools.
The coalition, titled “L.A. Parents Against Antisemitism,” also includes the Anti-Defamation League, StandWithUs, the Israeli-American Council and the Board of Rabbis of Southern California. The Federation’s press release states that the coalition became needed in light of the United Teachers of Los Angeles’s (UTLA) pending vote on a motion supporting the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement in September. The press release also noted that antisemitic incidents have spiked by 115% since the escalation between Israel and Hamas in May and that such incidents have occurred in Los Angeles, including a 12-year-old Jewish male being attacked in broad daylight on June 15.
“Our parents and teachers must organize to use the power of our united voices to ensure the safety and well-being of our children and Jewish community,” Alisa Finsten, Senior Vice President of Community Engagement for The Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles, said in a statement. “Now more than ever, it is wrong for any part of UTLA to take a stance on an issue that will cause personal harm and foster hate against an entire segment of its students and their families. We know our voices outnumber those who promote hate against us.”
“Our parents and teachers must organize to use the power of our united voices to ensure the safety and well-being of our children and Jewish community.”
The motion was initially passed by UTLA Area chapters on May 19; it stated, in part: “As public school educators in the United States of America, we have a special responsibility to stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people because of the 3.8 billion dollars annually that the US government gives to Israel, thus directly using our tax dollars to fund apartheid and war crimes.” UTLA said in a June 1 statement that motions passed at Area meetings don’t reflect the opinions of the union’s leadership and that the UTLA House of Representatives will later vote on it. A teacher in the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) resigned from the union due to the upcoming vote.
Randi Weingarten, President of the American Federation for Teachers (AFT) with which UTLA is affiliated, wrote in a June 14 letter to Anti-Defamation League (ADL) CEO Jonathan Greenblatt that AFT doesn’t support BDS but “locals have broad autonomy, and the national union does not override locals over differences or questions of policy.” She also noted that UTLA issued a statement condemning antisemitism and that AFT has passed “numerous resolutions decrying antisemitism, Islamophobia, anti-Asian sentiments, racism and other forms of hate.” Greenblatt called her response “deeply disappointing” in a statement to the Journal, stating that “a simple, succinct and unqualified condemnation of anti-Jewish hate would have been a more appropriate response to this moment of crisis when Jewish students, parents, faculty and administrators are seeking support.”
