The far-right provocateurs of Accuracy in Media (AIM) sent a truck to the Queens school of New York City math teacher Mohammad Ahmad with his image on an electronic billboard and a statement he made on X/Twitter in October that read, “I have no room for Zionists. I make no space for genocidal white supremacists.” 

Along with other quotes from Ahmad, the billboard called on viewers to “take action.” AIM also posted several witch-hunting videos on its Twitter/X feed filmed in front of his school, including one accusing the school of teaching antisemitism. 

In a reply on Twitter/X Ahmad said, “Zionists’ ‘play’ is to disrupt education by flooding inboxes & making it difficult for people to do their jobs, disrupting education by harassing school communities, & disrupting education by literally spreading misinformation and lies.”

While most Queens residents would neither be shocked by nor disagree with Ahmad’s statements on the billboards, AIM’s actions are a part of a well-funded campaign to intimidate the many educators and students who have opposed the Gaza genocide being perpetrated by Israel with the full backing of President Joe Biden. AIM also has sent a truck with electronic billboards to the school of Philadelphia teacher Hannah Gann and posted images on its Twitter/X feed. 

Similar trucks have appeared broadcasting names and personal information at Columbia University, the City University of New York and Harvard University.

AIM also set up a special website that attempts to slander Ahmad. It is a hysterical amalgam of Ahmad’s university affiliation, his entirely principled statements on Twitter/X and the regurgitation of Zionist lies of mass rape and other supposed atrocities on October 7. There is no mention of the mass murder of 30,000 Palestinians, predominantly women and children, by bombing, summary execution, starvation, and denial of medical care, much less the abduction and torture of civilians by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). The page reads like a Nazi or Ukrainian nationalist newspaper in 1942 broadcasting “Bolshevik barbarism.”

Ahmad was initially doxxed and attacked in October by the Murdoch rag the New York Post and Fox News over his Twitter statements, which dared to justify the Palestinians’ fight against 75 years of ethnic cleansing, mass killing, military occupation and the denial of basic democratic rights. 

He took aim at remarks in support of Israel issued by Chancellor of Schools David Banks: “So-called ‘Israel’ has continually indiscriminately killed civilians, children, the elderly, the press, and medical workers and targeted schools, places of worship, and medical facilities … Now [Banks] has the time to send us Zionist propaganda to our official work emails.”

In a statement about the most recent incident, Department of Education (DOE) spokesman Nathaniel Styer said, “No member of our school community should be harassed or targeted—even if they are expressing opinions we disagree with.” 

Every educator, student and parent, however, knows that these words are a charade, and that DOE will do nothing to stop the harassment of its teachers and students by right-wing extremists. Chancelor Banks and Democratic Mayor Eric Adams have made it plain that they will do whatever they can to legitimize Zionism and the Gaza genocide and suppress pro-Palestinian viewpoints.

Last month the news journal Hellgate reported that after the parent volunteer Community Education District (CEC) 14 issued a statement in favor of a ceasefire, its members were sent hostile and harassing emails and phone calls, and death-threats; human feces was deposited in the mailbox of the head of CEC 14.

Parents told Hellgate that the DOE had done nothing to protect them. At a press conference CEC 14 President Tajh Sutton said, “We have had no response to the targeted attacks and harassment on elected parent leaders and on our precious children who are participating in civic engagement by standing up against oppression.” Instead, the DOE reprimanded the parents for taking security precautions during Zoom meetings. 

Mayor Adams himself has on several occasions expressed his support for Israel and slandered those who have protested the genocide. In November he took an active role in defaming students who protested against the genocide at a high school in Queens when he said, “The vile show of antisemitism at Hillcrest High School was motivated by ignorance-fueled hatred, plain and simple, and it will not be tolerated in any of our schools, let alone anywhere else in our city.”

The United Federation of Teachers (UFT), of which Ahmad is a member, has issued no statement in his defense. It has never publicly defended any educator from defamation by the right-wing media and has refused to even call for a ceasefire in Gaza, despite protests by educators in front of UFT headquarters. 

While Randi Weingarten, the head of the American Federation of Teachers, with which the UFT is affiliated, and a self-proclaimed Zionist, has called in extremely cautious terms for a ceasefire, she has been one of the leading forces in the American trade unions backing the reelection of Biden, the quartermaster for the Gaza slaughter. 

Fascist and Zionist organizations are now seeing how far they can go in their harassment of the tens of thousands of active opponents in New York City of Israel’s four-month long murder-spree in Gaza, particularly educators. They are encouraged by the support the DOE and the UFT have given to the Zionists, as well as by Columbia University’s inaction against Zionist students who attacked and poisoned pro-Palestinian protesters with “skunk spray” on January 19.

Many educators have already registered their disgust at the treatment of Ahmad. New York City Educators for Palestine noted in its Twitter/X feed, “Today, a doxxing truck from a Zionist organization circled a NYC public school. They are attacking Mohammad for his social media posts from his personal account. He and his family have received death threats & there is a coordinated effort to ruin his career,” and called for letters of protest. 

The attempt to intimidate Ahmad is directed at the whole working class which has become increasingly disgusted at the material aid the Biden administration is giving to the Zionist slaughter and with the trade unions, which have endorsed Biden for president. 

Educators and all workers need to organize independently of the union bureaucrats who, one and all, support the Democratic Party’s drive to war with Russia and the continued attacks on Palestinians—and the sweeping cuts to education and social services that will be used to pay for it. 

Educators who want to take up the fight to defend their democratic rights and stop war and genocide should contact the Educators Rank-and-File Safety Committee.