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wave of bills introduced this year in state legislatures across the country sought to censor Palestine-related education in public schools. Several passed with the support of pro-Israel Democratic lawmakers, a trend that educators and First Amendment advocates told\u00a0Truthout<\/em>\u00a0reflects the alignment of pro-Israel groups with MAGA forces. As these efforts continue, many said they fear public education could be reshaped far beyond social studies classrooms and the topics of Israel and Palestine.<\/p>\n \u201cThe censorship of Palestinians is the same as the \u2018Don\u2019t Say Gay,\u2019 and the anti-critical race theory attacks on Black history,\u201d Nora Lester-Murad, an organizer with the\u00a0#DropTheADLfromSchools<\/a>\u00a0effort, told\u00a0Truthout<\/em>. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) is one of a number of pro-Israel groups supporting regressive public education legislation across the country. \u201cYes, it\u2019s Zionist, and yes, it\u2019s promoting Israel, but it\u2019s also part of this right-wing effort to take public education in a direction that\u2019s away from critical thinking and that\u2019s anti-liberatory.\u201d<\/p>\n This year, legislators in at least eight states \u2014 including\u00a0Arizona<\/a>,\u00a0Arkansas<\/a>,\u00a0Kansas<\/a>,\u00a0Kentucky<\/a>,\u00a0Missouri<\/a>,\u00a0Nebraska<\/a>,\u00a0Oklahoma<\/a>, and\u00a0Tennessee<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 introduced bills that would directly adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism in public schools. That definition equates criticism of Israel with antisemitism. Dozens of\u00a0civil society and<\/a>\u00a0rights groups<\/a>, as well as\u00a0unions of educators<\/a>, have warned against its adoption because of its power to chill or suppress speech critical of Israel or Zionism.<\/p>\n Michael Berg, an organizer with Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) in Missouri, said lawmakers who sponsored House Bill (HB) 937 seemed more committed to preventing teachers and pupils from criticizing Israel than preventing discrimination against Jewish students. \u201cThey were attached to the IHRA definition, so it shows that it\u2019s very specifically about speech about Israel,\u201d he said. Organizers succeeded in stopping HB 937 in Missouri this year, but Berg told\u00a0Truthout<\/em>\u00a0they are already preparing to fight a new iteration of the bill in the upcoming legislative session.<\/p>\n Other states have made similar efforts, including California, where Democrats hold a supermajority in the state assembly. There, this year\u2019s\u00a0Assembly Bill (AB) 715<\/a>\u00a0was the\u00a0latest in a series<\/a>\u00a0introduced under the guise of curbing antisemitism, but whose critics\u00a0argue are censorship bills<\/a>\u00a0that undermine the implementation of earlier legislation mandating ethnic studies courses in public schools. AB 715 does not define antisemitism, but calls for using the Biden-era\u00a0United States National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism<\/a> as \u201ca basis to inform schools on how to identify, respond to, prevent, and counter antisemitism.\u201d That white paper claims that \u201cthe \u00a0United States National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism<\/a>\u00a0as \u201ca basis to inform schools on how to identify, respond to, prevent, and counter antisemitism.\u201d That white paper claims that \u201cthe United States has embraced\u201d IHRA\u2019s definition as a \u201cvaluable tool\u201d in countering antisemitism. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed AB 715 into law in October; the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) filed a suit\u00a0challenging the law in federal court<\/a>\u00a0in November.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, this August in Massachusetts, another Democratic stronghold, the state\u2019s Special Commission on Combating Antisemitism\u00a0approved recommendations<\/a>\u00a0meant to curb antisemitism in schools.\u00a0The recommendations<\/a>\u00a0call on districts to teach IHRA\u2019s definition of antisemitism in anti-bias trainings for teachers and school administrators.\u00a0A statewide coalition<\/a>\u00a0of labor unions, civil rights groups, and progressive Jewish organizations\u00a0warned<\/a>\u00a0that rather than countering antisemitism, the recommendations \u201cpit some Jewish students against other marginalized populations\u201d and will likely \u201cundermine safe learning and working environments for students and teachers.\u201d<\/p>\n These moves dovetail with a federal agenda to remake the nation\u2019s public schools and historical programming at other public institutions, such as museums and national parks. Since his return to office, President Donald Trump has signed executive orders demanding an end to \u201cradical indoctrination<\/a>\u00a0in K-12 schooling\u201d and \u201crestoring truth and sanity<\/a>\u00a0to American history.\u201d The administration advocates teaching a whitewashed and aggrandizing version of the nation\u2019s past that Trump, in one executive order, called \u201cpatriotic education.\u201d<\/p>\n The fact that pro-Israel Democratic lawmakers and groups that have traditionally enjoyed reputations as liberal organizations, such as the ADL, have been driving forces behind the recent spate of public education censorship bills comes as no surprise to Lara Kiswani, executive director of\u00a0AROC Action<\/a>\u00a0and an organizer with the\u00a0California Coalition to Defend Public Education<\/a>\u00a0(CCDPE), which mobilized against AB 715. \u201cIt\u2019s a right-wing agenda to support genocide [and] it\u2019s a right-wing agenda to support segregation and apartheid, so it\u2019s not a surprise that pro-Israel interest groups, who are inherently right-wing, are aligning themselves with the MAGA interest groups across the country,\u201d she told\u00a0Truthout<\/em>.<\/p>\n Theresa Monta\u00f1o, a former public school teacher who now teaches Chicano\/a Studies at California State University, Los Angeles, told\u00a0Truthout<\/em>\u00a0the harms of this regressive legislation are already being felt. \u201cThere have been a number of incidents where teachers and educators are reported for being antisemitic, and [the IHRA] definition is the reason why,\u201d she said. \u201cIt has already impacted the lives, reputations, and livelihoods of so many.\u201d<\/p>\n Monta\u00f1o was herself a named defendant in a lawsuit filed in 2022 by the Deborah Project, a pro-Israel firm, on behalf of teachers and parents who accused her and other defendants of using antisemitic content in their classrooms. That case was\u00a0dismissed in November 2024<\/a>, with the judge criticizing the plaintiff\u2019s\u00a0lack of evidence<\/a>\u00a0and unpersuasive arguments. Monta\u00f1o told\u00a0Truthout<\/em>: \u201cToday, it\u2019s Palestine. Tomorrow, is it the rainbow flag on my door, the fact that I talk about settler colonialism in the southwest, [or] my Black Lives Matter poster?\u201d<\/p>\n When Arizona passed a bill in May 2025 that would have adopted IHRA\u2019s definition of antisemitism for identifying antisemitic conduct in schools, Gov. Katie Hobbs vetoed it, recognizing in the wake of cases like Monta\u00f1o\u2019s that the bill was about\u00a0\u201cattacking our teachers.<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n The recent wave of bills limiting Palestine-related speech in public schools also harms students. \u201cWe believe that antisemitism is being used to censor education on Palestine, and we believe that our students have a right to understand both sides of an issue,\u201d Seth Morrison, spokesperson for JVP\u2019s Bay Area chapter and an organizer with CCDPE, told\u00a0Truthout<\/em>. \u201cWe\u2019re not saying don\u2019t talk about Israel or don\u2019t talk about the Holocaust. What we\u2019re saying is that there are many open issues here and that Arab and Muslim students especially are being intimidated and censored because of IHRA and related activities.\u201d<\/p>\n In California, efforts to censor Palestine in the classroom are disrupting the rollout of ethnic studies courses, meaning students are being left with fewer opportunities to learn about the communities of color that\u00a0comprise almost three-quarters<\/a>\u00a0of the state\u2019s student population. Since its case against Monta\u00f1o,\u00a0the Deborah Project has also sued<\/a>\u00a0the Mountain View\u2013Los Altos High School District and the Hayward Unified School District for release of records related to ethnic studies instruction; both districts settled and agreed to cover the firm\u2019s legal fees. This February, a suit brought by the Louis D. Brandeis Center\u00a0succeeded in stopping ethnic studies<\/a>\u00a0instruction in the Santa Ana Unified School District.<\/p>\n ADC\u2019s case against AB 715 argues the new law violates the First Amendment right of students to receive information in the classroom. \u201cCourts have held that the right to be exposed to different viewpoints [and] to have frank and open discussions and debates \u2026 is protected in public schools under the First Amendment,\u201d Jenin Younes, ADC\u2019s national legal director, explained to\u00a0Truthout<\/em>.<\/p>\n Plaintiffs\u2019 stories in that case show how Palestine-related speech arises even in unexpected places, and how censoring it could limit learning experiences. Jonah Olson, a plaintiff and middle school science teacher in Adelanto, California, told\u00a0Truthout<\/em>, \u201cI don\u2019t initiate a whole lot of political discussion in my science class, but I do try to foster, as per the NGSS framework, connections to real-world experiences, connecting those things to science and engineering practices.\u201d California adopted its\u00a0Next Generation Science Standards<\/a>, or NGSS, in 2015.<\/p>\n Recently, students in Olson\u2019s classes have chosen to research and experiment with water desalination and food preservation after learning, Olson suspects from social media, that people in Gaza have not had adequate potable water or food while living under Israeli bombardment for the past two years. \u201cThey\u2019re engaging in the world and seeing science and engineering questions and problems to be solved and then exercising that inquiry in the way they\u2019re supposed to [according to NGSS],\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019re citing in their projects the real-world connection to the genocide in Gaza.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n