NYC school said to decline Holocaust survivor’s talk over ‘messages on Israel, Palestine’

A Brooklyn middle school declined to host a motivational talk from a pro-Israel Holocaust survivor, saying his message would not be suitable for the students, The New York Post reported Tuesday.

MS 447 Principal Arin Rusch responded to a parent’s request that Sami Steigmann address students about antisemitism by saying his presentation would not be right for the school “given his messages around Israel and Palestine.”

While the head of a Jewish teachers’ advocacy group called the situation “appalling,” the city Department of Education backed the principal, as did the office of Mayor Eric Adams, a vocal Israel advocate.

A statement from City Hall said the mayor “is dedicated to ensuring all New Yorkers — particularly our students and young adults — hear stories from the genocide and oppression of the Holocaust, so we never again perpetrate such evil.”

“While this speaker wasn’t the right fit, we will continue to ensure our students hear from the living survivors of this history into the future.”

NYC Department of Education spokeswoman Nicole Brownstein told The Post, “We are proud to have welcomed many Holocaust survivors into our schools, including MS 447, to share their stories. We thoroughly evaluate every classroom speaker and are careful to ensure speakers maintain political neutrality, especially on contentious current events, as required in a public school setting.”

According to The New York Post, a parent had written to Rusch suggesting that Steigman speak at the Boerum Hill school.

In a responding letter on November 18, Rusch wrote, “In looking at his website material, I also don’t think that Sami’s presentation is right for our public school setting, given his messages around Israel and Palestine.”

“I’d love to explore other speakers,” she said, according to the report, and said that talks about the Holocaust and against antisemitism would be welcomed.

Steigmann, 85, does not mention the Israel-Hamas war on his homepage or in his biography, which does note that his family moved to Israel in the 1960s and that he served in the Israeli Air Force. His webpage focuses on his motivational messaging to young people, urging them to never lose hope and not stand by when there are problems they can help resolve.

However, on his Facebook page, Steigmann has posted content that said pre-state Palestine was the Jewish homeland.

Last month, he posted an image of the “Palestine Football Team” in 1939 that comprised Jewish players. “Back then, ‘Palestine’ meant the Jewish homeland. Let that sink in,” he wrote.

In July, he posted the headline from 1948 that read “Arabs invade Palestine.”

“Why should five Arab armies invade Palestine in 1948?” he wrote. “Because Palestine was Jewish before it became Israel. Common sense, really.”

And, in October 2023, days after the October 7 Hamas-led invasion of Israel that killed 1,200 people, Steinmann posted a cover of French-language Le Petit Journal, from 1929, that read “Trouble in Palestine: Fanatic Arabs massacre Jews in the streets of Jerusalem.”

“No modern, reestablished state of Israel, no ‘territories,’ no talk of ‘occupation’ or ‘settlements’,” wrote Steigmann in a comment with the post. “This killing spree was, and is, about Jew-hatred and incitement to kill. Hate is hate. Hate then looks a lot like hate today.”

He has also promoted StandWithUs, a Zionist advocacy organization, at lectures.

Steigmann, who gives lectures to audiences of all ages, insisted to The Post that he doesn’t discuss Middle East politics in public schools and would agree to stay away from the subject if asked.

“She didn’t even have the courtesy to call me,” he said of Rusch.

Moshe Spern, president of the United Jewish Teachers, complained about the issue in an email on November 26 to Brooklyn District 15 Superintendent Rafael Alvarez and aides of Schools Chancellor Melissa Avilas-Ramos.

Spern, the grandson of a Holocaust survivor, said the principal’s behavior was “appalling” and “personally offensive.”

The cancellation “begs the question of, ‘Are we now censoring Holocaust survivors for their views of Israel?’ ” he wrote.

Brooklyn City Councilwoman Inna Vernikov, a Ukranian-born Jew, told The Post, “It’s particularly abhorrent to deny someone who lived through the horrors of the Holocaust the opportunity to share his experience with students — particularly during a time when antisemitism is skyrocketing among our youth.”

“Not only is this behavior repugnant, but the school is potentially engaging in viewpoint discrimination in violation of the First Amendment and of Equal Protection that covers religious or ethnic discrimination. To see public schools engaging in this conduct is unsurprising, and we will not sit idly by.”

According to his website, Steigmann was born in what is now Ukraine on December 21, 1939. From 1941 through 1944, he and his parents were incarcerated at Mogilev-Podolsky, a labor camp in an area called Transnistria.

Dozens of his relatives were murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust.

He grew up in Transylvania, and, in 1961 his family moved to Israel, where he would serve in the air force, though not as a pilot. In 1968, he moved to the US. In 1983, he returned to Israel, then moved to New York City in 1988, where he now lives.

He has been recognized by the Claims Conference Compensation Program as a victim of medical experiments. Though he doesn’t recall what was done to him as he was too young, he has suffered from debilitating neck, head, and back problems throughout his life.