A teacher at Washington-Liberty High School received a threat the same day articles came out accusing a faculty member there of “drilling students on anti-Israel talking points.”
The Tuesday afternoon dispatch to the school did not say which teacher received the “strong” threats via email, prompting a police response. But it happened as articles were published on the conservative news site The Daily Wire and the New York Post about W-L English teacher Shayma Al-Hanooti.
“Al-Hanooti frequently brings her political views to school, drilling students on anti-Israel talking points and sparring with colleagues about the conflict in Gaza,” said The Daily Wire article. “Al-Hanooti… implied to students that Israel was committing genocide, sparred with superiors who prevented students from chanting anti-Semitic slogans, and dismissed colleagues who objected to her political statements.”
The articles were preceded last week by a report from an advocacy group containing emails obtained from Arlington Public Schools under the Freedom of Information Act.
Parents Defending Education, a self-described “grassroots organization working to reclaim our schools from activists promoting harmful agendas,” posted emails documenting Al-Hanooti giving students a number of “one-sided” assignments related to Gaza and the plight of the Palestinian people, while clashing with school leadership and fellow teachers.
This past November, she also “wrote to the school board and superintendent Francisco Duran, demanding to know why the school district hadn’t issued formal statements on its position on world disputes,” according to The Daily Wire.
The articles have prompted numerous tips to ARLnow and been a hot topic of conversation on some local education-focused Facebook groups.
But one parent with knowledge of the situation told us there were conversations behind closed doors well before the past week’s reporting. She said APS has held meetings with students and families regarding the teacher. Some have expressed concerns about perceived anti-Semitism, she said.
A single police car could be seen in a parking lot outside of the school just after 5 p.m. Tuesday. An Arlington County police spokeswoman said the investigation did not suggest a wider threat to the school.
“At approximately 4:32 p.m. on October 1, police were dispatched to the 1300 block of N. Stafford Street for the report of threats,” said ACPD spokeswoman Ashley Savage. “Upon arrival, it was determined the victim received an emailed threat to harm. The preliminary investigation did not reveal a threat to the school community. The investigation is ongoing.”
The D.C.-based Council on American-Islamic Relations issued the following statement Wednesday afternoon, calling on APS to protect Al-Hanooti.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today called on Arlington Public Schools in Northern Virginia to step up protection for a teacher who has reportedly been threatened after being targeted by a smear campaign over a critical thinking lesson she assigned to students that asked them to analyze and question both South African and Israeli arguments before the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
Shayma Al-Hanooti, a teacher at Washington-Liberty High School in Arlington, Virginia, reportedly received a threat after articles came out accusing her of using “anti-Israel talking points” in an International Baccalaureate English Language and Literature course. Al-Hanooti told CAIR that the group behind the smear campaign is conflating her instructions to students with comments students made in an online discussion.
[NOTE: The International Baccalaureate English Language and Literature course is designed to be a balanced examination of literary and nonliterary texts.]
Students were assigned: “South Africa vs. Israel at the Hague: Analysis of Rhetorical Appeal and Logical Fallacies.” Prompts included:
In your own words, what is the ICJ?
- Who is Gilad Erdan? What is his main argument? Identify at least one rhetorical appeal or logical fallacy in his remarks to the UN.
- Who is Riyad Mansour? What is his main argument? Identify at least one rhetorical appeal or logical fallacy in his remarks to the UN.
- In your own words, what are South Africa’s accusations against Israel?
- In your own words, what are South Africa’s immediate demands? […]
“No teacher should face threats or hate-filled intimidation for merely asking their students to think critically about important issues,” said CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell. “We urge the school district to take all measures necessary to protect this teacher from anti-Muslim hate and ensure that students can receive an education that embraces critical thinking, including about current events.”
He noted that earlier this week, CAIR urged all institutions of higher education and K-12 schools to protect anti-genocide students as National Bullying Prevention Month begins October 1.
The reports and the threat come amid a backdrop of a growing conflict in the Middle East, after Iran launched a missile barrage at Israel, which earlier carried out several major attacks on Hezbollah in Lebanon. Meanwhile, some 1,700 Israelis and tens of thousands of Palestinians have been killed in the Israel-Hamas war since the Oct. 7 attack on Israel.
