Teaneck High School Walk Out Puts Trenton on Blast: Respect Our Right to Speak in Solidarity with Palestine
Last year when students of Teaneck High School walked out to protest attacks on Palestinian civilians in Gaza by US supported Israel, Congressman Gottheimer reported them to the US Department of Education because he believes that advocacy for Palestine is “antisemitic.”
A year later there is an arrest warrant for Netanyahu for genocide which by all measures continues on full throttle. The Teaneck High School students have once again walked out on December 4. This time they had a message for Gottheimer who fancies himself the next Governor of NJ and for all of the politicians in Trenton who are scheming to eliminate our beloved FIrst Amendment right to protected free speech.
A central concern of the students was their demand for Teaneck and NJ to respect their protected right to free speech. They articulated this demand and it was communicated far beyond the Teaneck community as the protest was picked up by a state news site.
It is quite apt for the students to make this demand – they are showing maturity and stepping up to the political floor in NJ where led by Democratic Party legislators and fully supported by the Republicans, the NJ Senate and NJ Assembly are pushing laws that eliminate free speech protections for those high school students who walked out to advocate solidarity for Palestine and the rest of us across the whole state. The high school students served the first volley across the net that the fight to defend and keep our children, families, communities, colleagues and selves safe from repression is on! They are at the forefront and the message is resonating.
Here is more about the effort to eliminate our protected free speech rights and the political fight to defend:
There were at least two attempts of the Teaneck school board and administration to interfere with the students efforts to exercise their protected free speech rights on December 4. One is that a school board member contacted this editor and they made a request for us to remove the article about the planned high school student protest. The board member was suggesting that the protest could cause cuts in school funding. My response was that I would ask the students – and if they agreed with unpublishing the article about the event, I would take it down. Instead the students said leave the article up – the article stayed up.
The main reason given by the board member for suggesting this interference with the protected free speech of the students was mention that Teaneck had legal expenses due to the prior year’s protest. But it was Josh Gottheimer’s dictatorial action of reporting the high school students, not to the principal’s office but to the US Department of Education that created legal issues for the district.
The board member’s request of FightBackBetter to remove the article was not only an affront to the students and the community’s protected free speech rights but also an attempt to interfere with the free press rights of this editor. It is a feature of the disrespect the Teaneck establishment has for the protected First Amendment rights of its own community members but also a taste of the future of NJ with the laws Trenton is pushing.
The other way the Teaneck establishment attempted to interfere with protected speech is that the Teaneck school district administration notified the whole town with false information that the protest was not student run. Such action was misuse of public schools and the district offices to advocate against the views of the students by falsely smearing, creating uncertainty and fear and negative reaction to the planned protest. The district is in its rights to notify the community about events of concern but for it to suggest that there was something sinister about who was involved in the protest was clearly an attempt to sway the community against the students and to repress the success of the student voices.
But the students were able to respond to the malicious rumor with accurate information and got the message across in the news report to a much wider audience than the Teaneck residency which were misled by the administration. The news report articulated that the students made clear it was their event, they called and organized it. Community groups and individuals, PACC, CAIR and others were there in an observant support role having heard the news about the student announced walk out in advance at FightBackBetter, on Instagram and elsewhere. There was no reason for the district to send misleading information to the town but it is great that the students clarified the issue.
Rayan, one of the student organizers, says, “The flyer posted advertising the walkout clearly states that it’s student led. To add on, I was called into the principal’s office a day before the walkout to discuss safety measures, so it was assumed by the school that i was one of the organizers, which means it was obvious that this was student led.”
The student walk out was also an appropriate answer to Gottheimer who not only had attempted to interfere with the protected speech of the students last year, on November 18 2024 it was reported that in Gottheimer’s speech announcing his candidacy for NJ governor that he was calling for a massive legal lawfare and police crackdown against advocates for Palestine across the state in NJ. Congratulations to the high school students in the home base of Gottheimer, Teaneck – to walk out on December 4 with a key demand to respect the free speech of NJ communities.
The students of Teaneck High School stood up to Gottheimer, they stood up to both of the political parties that control Trenton and they told THEM hands off free speech but those were not the only accomplishments.
The professionalism of the student leaders was demonstrated in many ways. One significant move the students made was to reach out to FigthBackBetter with information about the event. The FightBackBetter article announcing the protest helped inform the supportive community of the important event as well as serving notice on Gottheimer, the Teaneck school board and administration and mayor and council that the students intended to exercise their protected free speech rights and they were not about to be intimidated. After I provided to the students the message from the school board member, the student contact informed this editor no, they prefer to leave the article UP at FIghtBackBetter. The student contact also suggested including the information about Gottheimer’s many attempts to dictate a book ban, forced university investment in Israel whose economy is disaster ridden given the genocide, a call for statewide crackdown on Palestine adcocacy and his support for lawfare warfare against his political opponents. This example should be heeded by all of us.
The article was widely circulated receiving over 1000 views which is a lot for FightBackBetter, but it also helped inform the community and touched off supportive discussions on how to support the students and assure that they were safe and protected. CAIR, PACC and many other organizations and individuals were on hand to support, observe and make sure that there was no physical intimidation of the high school students. The high school students called into action a strong adult contingent observing and supporting! Indeed maturity was all around among the adult supporters who correctly respected the leadership of the students and followed in the observant support role they were invited to play by the students.
The high school students set the tone of resistance to the effort to eliminate our beloved protected free speech rights in the state of NJ. Gottheimer openly is calling for a fascist crack down and none of the half dozen Democratic Party governor candiates have said one peep back retorting his call for fascist attack on a half miliion NJ citizens, voters and residents.
2025 will be the year of a free speech political showdown in NJ and we now have our marching orders from the exemplary leadership of Teaneck High School students.
Get we ready to defend our rights, our children, our families, our communities, our colleagues and partners in the movement for a Free Palestine and ourselves!
