Connecting Liberated Ethnic Studies and Hamas

The Dissidents

Welcome to the Radical Roots of Ethnic Studies, a series of the Dissidents Podcast, with your co-hosts, Jennifer Richmond and Brandy Shufutinsky. In this series we explore the radical roots of liberated ethnic studies, how extreme ideology is infiltrating our schools with the aim to indoctrinate instead of educate, and our search for solutions to empower parents, teachers and students, giving them the tools to embrace inquiry and to express their individuality.

Hamas’ recent terrorist attack in Israel has garnered the support of the Coalition for Liberated Ethnic Studies (CLES), a group that is designing curricula for K12 education and is involved in teacher training, funded in large part by California taxpayers. In this episode we discuss CLES’ support of Hamas, the subtle and sloganized language used by CLES and Hamas supporters that conflates hatred and terrorism with “resistance”, CLES Ethnic Studies curricula’s ideological emphasis on Palestine, and the release of recent curricula surrounding the attack that fails to address the nuance and complexity of the conflict.

Coalition for Empowered Education

Institute for Liberal Values

Podcast Notes:

Neo-Confederacy & Palestinian Ultranationalism: How Prejudice is Justified Through the Myth of “Lost Civilization”, Dmitri Shufutinsky in ISGAP Flashpoint, Feb 27, 2023

The Cult of ‘Antizionism’, Izabella Tabarovsky in Tablet Magazine, Sept 19, 2023

*You can find Izabella’s Afterword to Letters in Black and White on the Truth in Between website.*

*You can find the Coalition for Empowered Education’s downloadable letter to California superintendents on the Institute for Liberal Values website.”