This report communicates an analysis of the submissions to the Anti-Palestinian Racism in Schools Register (‘the Register’). Its aim was to collect and document experiences in education of being silenced and discriminated against for showing solidarity with Palestine since the beginning of the Gaza Genocide in October 2023. The authors of this report draw urgent attention to the extent of anti-Palestinian racism across Australian schools in the hope that policymakers, educational institutions, school authorities and civil organisations can collectively address this crisis.
The report shows how anti-Palestinian racism is deployed against members of the Palestinian community and their supporters. This report analyses the testimonies of 84 respondents to the Register, using research and theories that seek to understand settler colonialism and racism within education. In doing this, the analysis demonstrates how anti-Palestinian racism in Australia is connected to local and global racist systems.
The findings of the report are analysed in six sections:
- Repression;
- Penalising and discipline;
- Vilification and normalisation of racism;
- Breaches of policy;
- Racism limiting critical pedagogies;
- Impact of racism.
The following summarises the findings under each of these sections.
- Repression
Teachers and students (or their parent/guardian) reported a number of instances where discussion of Palestine was shut down in schools. This included when teachers handed out flyers to their colleagues for solidarity events with Palestine, and when students talked about Palestine in class, chose it as a topic for a project, or wore clothing or badges with a connection to Palestine. Teachers also reported being told not to show connection or solidarity with Palestine through their clothing or badges. Reasons for these directives offered by school authorities included other members of the community feeling ‘uncomfortable’ and ‘offended’ by the discussion or representation of Palestine, or that schools are supposed to be places of ‘neutrality’ and ‘objectivity’. These justifications were used to silence and censor views and experiences, and left students and staff fearful about engaging in important and open conversations about the political situation in Palestine, and Israeli violence towards Palestinians. Teachers, expected to abide by western ‘neutrality’ and post-racial harmony in their work rather than touch ‘unsafe’ topics, are penalised for enacting critical pedagogies that challenge the boundaries set by the hegemonic settler curriculum.
- Penalising and disciplining teachers and students
Many respondents reported being disciplined or penalised for expression of Palestinian culture or solidarity with Palestinians and their struggle against Israeli violence and occupation. Teachers publicly supporting Palestine were, for example, yelled at, sent a written directive to remove a Palestine sticker and badge, sent home, asked to remove a T-shirt, restricted in their movement around the school, not offered a new contract; casuals were denied work. One student was reported to the Australian Jewish Association for writing a monologue for a play performed prior to 7 October. Other students had Palestinian flags confiscated during a multicultural day celebration. There were many more examples.
- Vilification and normalisation of racism
Many of the reports to the Register demonstrated instances of vilification and normalisation of anti-Palestinian racism. This occurred through stereotypes, such as those that depict Palestinian people as terrorists, the idea that Palestinians deserve the violence and oppression perpetrated by the Israeli state, and the dehumanisation of Palestinians through assertion of Israeli aggression and power. There were reports of students wearing the keffiyeh being targeted by teachers, who sometimes linked this to terrorism and ‘radicalisation’, thus associating Palestinian cultural and political expression with an assumed inherent violence. These forms of vilification were part of the culture of repression occurring in schools, and contributed to the normalisation of anti-Palestinian racism.
- Breaches of policy
There are a number of national and state declarations and policies that stipulate the need for schools to engage in education that is inclusive of diversity in all its forms. The reports made to the Register highlighted a number of occasions in which such declarations were breached through the dismissal or shutting down of expression of Palestinian culture, knowledge, history or solidarity with the Palestinian struggle for freedom from the colonial occupation and destruction of their land, people and resources. In particular, in NSW, the silencing of Palestinian perspectives in schools is a direct breach of the ‘Controversial Issues in Schools’ policy, which directs teachers to ensure sensitivity and balance in their presentation of controversial issues, stating teachers ‘should ensure that a range of views on a subject are taken into account in designing suitable learning programs’. This was clearly not occurring in relation to Palestine where views supportive of Palestinians were being silenced.
- Racism limiting critical pedagogies
The capacity for teachers to engage with critical pedagogies that seek to understand power and transform relations of oppression and inequality were found to be severely limited by both a lack of knowledge about Palestine among teachers, and notions of multiculturalism that exclude Palestinians. Many respondents to the register reported teachers who had little knowledge of the history or cultures of Palestine. This illiteracy limited teachers’ capacity to engage with their students about the unfolding Gaza Genocide, or other issues associated with the Middle East region in the curriculum, resulting in silencing and repression. While many schools celebrate multiculturalism in their community, the racism directed towards Palestinian people during multicultural celebrations was significant and resulted in their exclusion or punishment. This limits the capacity for critical pedagogies and multicultural inclusion in schools.
- Impacts of racism
The impacts of this anti-Palestinian racism were significant. Participants reported feeling exhausted and dehumanised by having to constantly stand up for Palestinian rights in a hostile school environment. Many participants reported feeling hurt, sad, angry and upset. Intimidation and the punitive practices that were employed by schools to shut down, silence, erase and ban symbols of and discussion about Palestine led many to feel discriminated against, overwhelmed, scared and anxious.
These experiences suggest that prevailing settler colonial ideologies in Australian schools promote hostility towards racial solidarity in education work, in this case, solidarity expressed amid the genocide of the Palestinian people. School management and the Australian state’s commitment to white-informed notions of ‘neutrality’ and ‘comfort’ have contributed to, and legitimated, heightened rates of biased, unfair, discriminatory and violent workplace experiences. The experiences compiled by the Register also suggest that Australian illiteracy about the Middle East and settler colonialism is a significant factor in the use of power and control to manage dissenting perspectives in schools.