Current Events > Texas elementary school employee fired for not pledging allegiance...

(+) Yeah! (+)

to Israel
https://theintercept.com/2018/12/17/israel-texas-anti-bds-law/

A CHILDRENS SPEECH PATHOLOGIST who has worked for the last nine years with developmentally disabled, autistic, and speech-impaired elementary school students in Austin, Texas, has been told she can no longer work with the public school district after she refused to sign an oath vowing that she does not and will not engage in a boycott of Israel or otherwise tak[e] any action that is intended to inflict economic harm on that foreign nation. A lawsuit on her behalf was filed early Monday morning in a federal court in the Western District of Texas alleging a violation of her First Amendment right of free speech.

The child language specialist, Bahia Amawi, is a U.S. citizen who received a masters degree in speech pathology in 1999 and, since then, has specialized in evaluations for young children with language difficulties (see video below). Amawi was born in Austria and has lived in the U.S. for the last 30 years, fluently speaks three languages (English, German, and Arabic), and has four U.S.-born American children of her own.

Amawi began working in 2009 on a contract basis with the Pflugerville Independent School District, which includes Austin, to provide assessments and support for school children from the countys growing Arabic-speaking immigrant community. The children with whom she has worked span the ages of 3 to 11. Ever since her work for the school district began in 2009, her contract was renewed each year with no controversy or problem.

But this year, all of that changed. On August 13, the school district once again offered to extend her contract for another year by sending her essentially the same contract and set of certifications she has received and signed at the end of each year since 2009.

She was prepared to sign her contract renewal until she noticed one new, and extremely significant, addition: a certification she was required to sign pledging that she does not currently boycott Israel, that she will not boycott Israel during the term of the contract, and that she shall refrain from any action that is intended to penalize, inflict economic harm on, or limit commercial relations with Israel, or with a person or entity doing business in Israeli or in an Israel-controlled territory.

The language of the affirmation Amawi was told she must sign reads like Orwellian or McCarthyite self-parody, the classic political loyalty oath that every American should instinctively shudder upon reading.

That language would bar Amawi not only from refraining from buying goods from companies located within Israel, but also from any Israeli companies operating in the occupied West Bank (an Israeli-controlled territory). The oath given to Amawi would also likely prohibit her even from advocating such a boycott given that such speech could be seen as intended to penalize, inflict economic harm on, or limit commercial relations with Israel.

Whatever ones own views are, boycotting Israel to stop its occupation is a global political movement modeled on the 1980s boycott aimed at South Africa that helped end that countrys system of racial apartheid. It has become so mainstream that two newly elected members of the U.S. Congress explicitly support it, while boycotting Israeli companies in the occupied territories has long been advocated in mainstream venues by Jewish Zionist groups such as Peace Now and the Jewish American Zionist writer Peter Beinart.

This required certification about Israel was the only one in the contract sent to Amawi that pertained to political opinions and activism. There were no similar clauses relating to children (such as a vow not to advocate for pedophiles or child abusers), nor were there any required political oaths that pertained to the country of which she is a citizen and where she lives and works: the United States.

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Antifar posted...

a boycott of Israel

Does Israel produce anything?
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Texas Israeli crazy.
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Sounds like an easy lawsuit.
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A_Good_Boy posted...

Sounds like an easy lawsuit.

One can only hope.
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Maybe the school can defend itself with an insanity plea
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Imagine your employer forbidding you from refusing to buy products from a specific country.
"Hello, would you like to buy 100 crates of Israeli oranges? *ahem* You are contractually obliged to agree to this purchase. *ahem* So, what do you say?" *Wicked grin*
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This same shit happened in Kansas.
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what the fuck...
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Texas was a mistake
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DevsBro posted...

Antifar posted...

a boycott of Israel

Does Israel produce anything?

First thing off the top of my head I remember, SodaStream is Israel-based.
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That's messed up.

What's in it for that School District?
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pikachupwnage posted...

Texas Israeli crazy.

This was fucking funny CE come on.
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hockeybub89 posted...

Texas was a mistake

A lot of states have similar laws.
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Somewhere an employment lawyer has a stiffy
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Pflugerville

Not surprised, tbh.

Musourenka posted...

What's in it for that School District?

Christian Solidarity. Pflugerville is rather rural although urban sprawl might be getting some tendrils out in there. Basically "Jesus and Guns" land and no one on the school district board has had a 5 minute conversation with a Muslim in their lives.
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pikachupwnage posted...

pikachupwnage posted...

Texas Israeli crazy.

This was fucking funny CE come on.

I see what you did but it's too far off.

Is rail ee vs Is real ee
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