It’s bad enough when the city Department of Education coddles antisemitic high-school rioters and employs Jew-hating faculty; it’s beyond obscene when it sanctions the erasure of Israel on a map of the Middle East in one of its classrooms.
The map of the “Arab World” renaming Israel as “Palestine” (in fulfillment of the Israel-haters’ odious “From the river to the sea” aspiration) hangs in a classroom at PS 261 in Brooklyn, where Rita Lahoud gives students lessons in the Arab Culture Arts program.
Adding insult to injury, that program is funded by Qatar Foundation International, the US affiliate of the Qatar Foundation, which is controlled by the country’s ruling Al Thani royal family.
Why in heaven’s name is the Department of Education taking a dime from the government of Qatar, which gives sanctuary to Hamas’ leaders and the financiers of the Oct. 7 atrocities against unarmed Israeli civilians?
In fact, records show that QFI donated over $1 million to the Department of Education from 2019 to 2022.
In 2019 and 2020, about $240,000 went to fund dual-language Arabic programs at PS 261 and PS 30 in Brooklyn; by 2022, it had doubled to $513,000.
But with “free money” comes influence; that one odious map is likely the tip of an iceberg: What other propaganda, antisemitic or otherwise, is sneaking in?
The DOE needs to stop taking the Qatari cash immediately.
The antisemitic Hillcrest HS riot (and the despicable behavior of the Yonkers Roosevelt HS girls basketball team against Jewish opponents) should serve as a warning: Educators must take a collective stand against antisemitism.
And stop taking foreign bribes to promote hate.