Fieldston, Elite Private School, Faces Backlash From Jewish Parents

Ethical Culture Fieldston, one of New York City’s most proudly progressive private schools, is facing a backlash over its handling of race, religion and ethnicity for the second time in less than a year.

In the past few months, some Jewish parents have accused school administrators of not acting aggressively enough to address what the parents said were anti-Semitic comments by at least one teacher and a guest speaker.

The tensions boiled over on Thursday, when the school fired a history teacher who has criticized Israel in school and on a personal Twitter account.

The dismissal of the teacher, J.B. Brager, which came after an assembly focused on anti-Semitism and anti-bias training, was first reported by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. The move quickly touched off a protest by Fieldston graduates.

Lauren Coulston, a spokeswoman for the school, declined to discuss the precise reasons for the firing, saying that Fieldston “does not comment on personnel matters.”

“We can reaffirm, however, that the school does not tolerate hurtful offensive or exclusionary content or comments from any member of the community,” Ms. Coulston said on Friday. “Students, parents, employees, and other members of our community all face consequences for behavior of this nature.”

The episode comes at a highly charged moment for the school, and for New York.

Fieldston spent much of last year trying to contain a rebellion by its students, some of whom locked themselves in buildings on the school’s campus in the Riverdale section of the Bronx in March to protest what they said was a racist school culture.

The school agreed to many of the students’ demands, including anti-bias training and a commitment to hire more teachers of color.

But the fragile peace that followed was short-lived. The student protests about perceived racism against people of color soon gave way to anger among Jewish parents concerned about anti-Semitism.

In November, Kayum Ahmed, a director at the Open Society Foundations philanthropic organization who had been invited to speak at an assembly at the high school, responded to a student’s question about South Africa by linking what Jews endured during the Holocaust to violence against Palestinians in Israel.

As part of an answer about victims of violence becoming perpetrators in South Africa, Mr. Ahmed said, “I use the same example in talking about the Holocaust. That Jews who suffered in the Holocaust and established the State of Israel today, they perpetuate violence against Palestinians.”

Some parents, offended by the comment, urged school leaders to issue a forceful statement condemning it. The debate over Mr. Ahmed’s remarks was reported by the online publication Tablet as well as the Washington Free Beacon.

Two days after the assembly, Mr. Ahmed received an email from Fieldston’s high school principal, Nigel Furlonge, according to copies of the emails that Mr. Ahmed shared with the Times.

Mr. Furlonge wrote that, “many, many members of the community found your talk engaging and insightful,” but added that the comment about Israel “landed in some difficult ways for some members of our community.”

Mr. Furlonge invited Mr. Ahmed to share some more context about his remarks to avoid, as Mr. Furlonge said, “further interpretation” from parents and students.

In a lengthy response, Mr. Ahmed said he was “deeply opposed” to anti-Semitism and did not believe his remarks fit any definition of anti-Semitism he was familiar with. He also praised Fieldston’s students and apologized for “any difficulty” he had caused the school’s administrators.

But Mr. Furlonge did not include any of Mr. Ahmed’s response in an email sent a few days later to Fieldston parents and students. Mr. Furlonge and Jessica Bagby, the high school principal, called Mr. Ahmed’s remarks “deeply hurtful.” The school, Ms. Bagby and Mr. Furlonge wrote, “vehemently opposes anti-Jewish words, deeds, and sentiment.”

Before the winter break, Fieldston scheduled an assembly focused on anti-Semitism for Thursday, Jan. 9, and announced that two Reform Jewish rabbis would speak.

Fieldston was founded in the late 19th century by Felix Adler, a Jewish educator, and has long served a significant number of Jewish students. But parents’ concerns that the school has looked the other way on anti-Semitism have plagued Ms. Bagby throughout her four-year tenure.

The New York Times reported in 2017 that she had referred privately to “Zionist” parents raising questions about aspects of the school’s experimental approach to combating racism.

The comment alarmed George Burns, the principal of Fieldston’s lower school at the time, The Times reported. Mr. Burns’s unexpected departure that year prompted a torrent of anger from parents, teachers and students.

Fieldston, which has around 1,700 students from prekindergarten through 12th grade and annual tuition of about $53,000, is substantially more racially diverse than many other private schools in the city, and it awards more than $14 million a year in financial aid.

The debate at the school is playing out against a backdrop of heightened tensions among Jewish residents of New York and the surrounding area.

Orthodox Jews have faced a series of violent anti-Semitic attacks across the city and state in recent weeks, prompting local officials to increase security in neighborhoods with large Jewish populations.

This week, tens of thousands of people marched against anti-Semitism in New York City. In an email this month, Ms. Bagby encouraged Fieldston families to join the march.

Dr. Brager, the teacher who was dismissed, is transgender and uses the pronouns they and them. Complicating the debate over the comments that some parents objected to, Dr. Brager is also Jewish.

The Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported that Dr. Brager’s Twitter account, which by Friday had been made private, had included posts critical of the two rabbis asked to speak at Thursday’s assembly.

“Sure go ahead and invite two white men who run Reform congregations, both of whom are Zionists,” Dr. Brager said in one message. After Mr. Ahmed’s comments in November, Dr. Brager wrote on Twitter, “I refuse to ‘reaffirm the value’ of ethnonationalist settler colonialism,” according to Tablet.

Two Fieldston parents who spoke to their children about the assembly and reviewed a brief video clip of the meeting said that Dr. Brager had raised a middle finger at one of the rabbis before walking out of the room during the assembly on Thursday.

Dr. Brager did not respond to a request for comment.

Jonathan Greenblatt, the chief executive of the Anti-Defamation League, said on Friday that the group was “pleased that the Fieldston administration took this matter seriously and heard the concerns of students and parents who were justifiably appalled by the faculty member’s hurtful and offensive tweets.”

But a letter protesting Dr. Brager’s firing and calling on the school to reinstate them had collected several hundred signatures since Thursday evening.

“We see clearly that Fieldston administrators Jessica Bagby and Nigel Furlonge are not interested in addressing anti-Semitism or protecting Jewish community members,” the letter said, “but in signaling to conservative Jewish donors that the school will punish dissenters from those donors’ views.”