US teacher union criticized for BDS, ceasefire, campus protest resolutions

The American Federation of Teachers (AFT) is set to vote on seven proposed resolutions touching on divestment from Israel, an Israeli-Hamas ceasefire, and anti-Israel campus protests at its July 22-25 Houston national convention, drawing ire and criticism from US Jewish and pro-Israel groups.

The resolutions were condemned on Monday by the New York City Public School (NYCPS) Alliance, Educators Caucus for Israel, Partners for Equality and Educational Responsibility in K-12 (PeerK12), and StandWithUs as antisemitic.

AFT President Randi Weingarten said on social media on Tuesday that the union was a democracy in which many proposals were submitted, but until adopted should only be considered as proposals. Weingarten only issued support for a ceasefire in Gaza.

The 88th AFT National Convention will discuss a resolution submitted by the Berkeley Federation of Teachers proposing that the second largest teacher’s union call on teachers’ pension funds to divest from companies that it claimed facilitated Israeli “human rights violations and violations of international law as part of prolonged military occupations, apartheid, and genocide.”

The proposal for the AFT International Relations Committee listed Boeing, General Dynamics, Caterpillar, Palantir Technologies, and Valero Energy as examples of companies that the Berkeley teachers believed should be boycotted.

The same Berkeley group submitted a resolution calling on the US government to immediately end all military aid to Israel as long as Israel blocked “substantive and meaningful aid to Gaza.”

The coalition of Jewish education groups condemned the two resolutions for labeling Israel’s war against Gazan terrorist organizations as “genocide,” saying the inflammatory language revived “ancient blood-libel accusations against Jews worldwide.”

Two other divestment resolutions called for the sale of AFT’s sole foreign state bond, an Israeli bond valued at $150,000. An AFT Oregon proposal resolved not to purchase further bonds from Israel, while the resolution submitted by American Association of University Professors (AAUP) Advocacy, University of Illinois Chicago Graduate Employees, and University of Vermont Medical Center Support Staff United would position AFT against the purchase of bonds from any foreign governments.

The latter proposal explained that the divestment should be pursued because of the IDF’s supposed “scholasticide” of Gazan education facilities and alleged killing of healthcare workers and destruction of medical centers.

Jewish groups say singling out Israel is "discrimination"

The Jewish groups lambasted the two resolutions for singling out Israel as discrimination, and accused the proposal proponents as seeking “to support the ongoing effort to eliminate Israel as the democratic state of the Jewish people.”

The coalition also attacked a resolution proposal for solidarity with campus anti-Israel protesters, arguing that it sought to endorse activists who engaged in protests that disregarded the rights and safety of Jewish and Israeli students and staff.

The Chicago Teachers Union had proposed that the AFT demand that academic administrators cease suspensions, expulsions, and use of law enforcement agencies to respond to the protests, which since mid-April have included the occupation of campus buildings and grounds with encampments.

The proposal claimed the protests sought humanitarian aid passage, a ceasefire, and the release of hostages, and that administrators were engaging in “state-sanctioned violence” against the exercise of free speech.

A resolution calling for an immediate bilateral ceasefire, delivery of humanitarian aid, and release of hostages held by Hamas was also submitted for the convention. The United Faculty of Miami Dade College proposal condemned the October 7 massacre and loss of Palestinian life in the subsequent Israeli operation, arguing that there was no military solution to the conflict. Hamas was criticized for sacrificing Gazans to achieve its political ends and was charged with not being a credible partner for peace, but also condemned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his “far-right government” as an obstacle to lasting peace and a two-state solution.

NYCPS, ECI, PeerK12, and SWU contended that an American workers union should tell another state how to defend itself and slammed any equivocation between Hamas and the democratically elected Israeli government.

A seventh resolution submitted to the AFT’s Human Rights Committee by AAUP Advocacy opposed the May Antisemitism Awareness Act and its Senate companion piece, arguing that the legislation, the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance working definition for antisemitism and similar definitions censored political speech. The proposal described such measures as the “weaponization of antisemitism” to censor Palestinians and dissenting views on the Israel-Hamas war.

The Jewish groups alleged that the resolution would allow AFT members to exhibit antisemitic behavior without consequences.

“This motion claims that Jews should not define Jew-hatred, thereby undermining our right to protect ourselves from discrimination and violence,” said the groups.

PeerK12 co-founder Nicole Bernstein said in a statement that “Each one of these anti-Israel, anti-Zionist, and anti-Jewish resolutions is based on propaganda and politically subversive and ideologically driven lies; exposing yet again the deeply unsettling and obvious lack of merit, or even the slightest desire of the AFT to adhere to the indisputable facts and historical accuracy that one might expect from a national association.“

The coalition called on educators, policymakers, and community members to condemn the resolutions and for the AFT to withdraw them from the conference agenda.