The House Committee on Education and Workforce is investigating whether public schools in Philadelphia are failing to meet their obligation under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by allowing antisemitic harassment to fester, following reports from the Washington Examiner and other organizations.
Members of Congress are concerned that “antisemitic incidents have continued to proliferate” in Philadelphia after its school district entered into a federally mandated agreement with the Department of Education to address the problem, according to a letter sent on Monday. As possible evidence for the persistence of such harassment, the congressional committee pointed toward allegations that teachers in the city disseminated “class materials [that] rationalize terrorist violence” and that the district’s partner organizations harbor antisemites.
The Washington Examiner previously reported that a network of education nonprofits had been distributing pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel materials to public school classrooms across the country, especially in Philadelphia.
One lesson included among the materials was an activity titled “Israeli Apartheid: A Simulation.” To conduct the exercise, teachers are instructed to divide their students into groups of Israelis and Palestinians. Israeli students are to be given pieces of candy and a degree of authority over their fellow students who have been designated as Palestinians. The children designated as Palestinians, meanwhile, have their drawings torn up and are relegated to small corners of the classroom while the teacher confiscates their candy.
The simulation is intended to portray racism in contemporary Israel. A document compiled by the North American Values Institute accuses the materials used by Philadelphia educators of devaluing the Holocaust and justifying the October 7 attacks. A student testimonial used to promote these materials thanked the authors for helping her “understand the frustrations that led to Oct. 7,” which NAVI said “suggests that students learn to rationalize terrorist violence.”
A poem written by Palestinian activist and journalist Mohammed El-Kurd, who has faced criticism from a wide array of groups over his alleged glorification of Palestinian terrorism, was also included among the materials.
“I dare you to look into the eyes of a Gazan child and tell him you tried your best,” El-Kurd said at a pro-Palestinian rally in London in early 2024. “Our day will come. But we must not be complacent. Our day will come, but we must normalize massacres as a status quo.”
Noura Erakat, Maha Nassar, and Nora Murad — other academics accused of expressing support for Palestinian terrorists — also authored content contained in the materials being disseminated.
“The House Education and Workforce Committee has done important work exposing how antisemitism has taken root in higher education,” NAVI director of government affairs Clifford Smith told the Washington Examiner. “But as this new letter makes clear, K-12 schools urgently need the same level of scrutiny. What’s happening in our elementary, middle, and high schools is not abstract — it directly affects children, families, and teachers every single day.”
Materials aside, educator activists in Philadelphia have held trainings where their fellow teachers denied that Hamas was responsible for human rights abuses in Gaza, minimized the October 7 terrorist attacks by comparing them to “pok[ing] someone’s arm,” and argued against presenting “both sides” of the conflict between Israel and Hamas, suggesting that doing so is a symptom of “white supremacy,” the Washington Examiner previously reported.
A reading list curated by the Palestinian Youth Movement, which praised Hamas in the immediate aftermath of the October 7 terrorist attacks, was also circulated by Philadelphia educators. In a similar vein, the congressional letter cites the Washington Free Beacon’s reporting on the Philadelphia Public Schools’ partnership with the city’s chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. CAIR has faced criticism over its alleged defense of Hamas, which, alongside its relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood, recently prompted Texas to designate it as a terrorist organization.
The congressional letter addressed to Philadelphia Public Schools is part of a broader push to investigate K-12 antisemitism, as the committee sent similar messages to schools in Fairfax, Virginia, and Berkeley, California, around the same time.
“These inquiries also create an opportunity to examine the influence of outside activist organizations — such as Rethinking Schools — that have shaped training, curriculum, and school culture in ways that often blur the line between political advocacy and classroom education,” Smith told the Washington Examiner.
Indeed, multiple teachers in Philadelphia have mentioned preparing students to engage in pro-Palestinian activism as a goal for their teaching, with some students engaging in anti-Israel protests following encouragement from teachers and administrators.
Jewish parents with students enrolled in the Philadelphia school district previously told the Washington Examiner that they had sent dozens of emails to district administrators with concerns about antisemitism but have received no response, a point highlighted by the House Education Committee.
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In an attempt to help remedy the situation, the House Education Committee is demanding documents from Philadelphia Public Schools containing all the complaints it has received regarding antisemitic incidents, the curricular materials that have been used by educators regarding Israel, Palestine, and Jewish people, as well as the content shown in anti-discrimination trainings, particularly as it relates to antisemitism.
The school district has until December 8 to respond.