Wonder Hlongwa
A Jewish extremist group has threatened to “take action” against a Johannesburg Muslim family because of what a 14-year-old wrote in a history assignment.
Last week, the Jewish Defence League (JDL) wrote a letter to Hassan Cassim, father of Layla, a grade eight pupil at Crawford College, demanding that she retract the contents of her assignment.
“Unless our requirements are immediately fulfilled, be assured we will act,” the group’s letter read.
The threat came after Layla, who attends the mostly Jewish college in Johannesburg, was asked by her history teacher to respond to a pro-Israeli article about the conflict in the Middle East between the Israelis and the Palestinians. Both articles were pasted on the college’s notice board.
“My aim in writing this article is to conscientise and educate this predominantly Jewish school, on the other side of the story,” wrote Layla in her assignment last month.
“This is an endeavour to put forth the views of people who have suffered tremendously since the birth of Israel … As long as Israel denies the Palestinian people the right to have their land back, it denies and mocks their right to be treated as human beings.”
This angered some of Layla’s Jewish schoolmates and prompted the extremist group to demand the immediate withdrawal of the article’s contents.
Although the JDL is little known in South Africa, the group’s actions have often been associated with violence in other parts of the world.
While it is banned in Israel where it originated in the 1960s, the group is still active in the United States and Europe.
The group’s founding leader, Rabbi Meir Kahane, was assassinated by a Palestinian Arab in 1989 in New York.
One of the group’s slogans says: “The JDL is in South Africa to carry on the fight against the enemies of the Jewish people.”
The letter to Hassan Cassim read: “You are further required to furnish our organisation with assurances that there will be no anti-Jewish sentiments emanating from your daughter.”
It adds that the group is not interested in freedom of speech.
A representative of the group, Frank Startz, who acknowledged writing the letter, refused to elaborate on its threats. “I’m not prepared to give any details,” he said.
However, the Jewish Board of Deputies judged that Layla’s article contained no anti-Semitism.
A member of the board, speaking on condition of anonymity, said it is experiencing problems with the JDL. “They threaten people and see anti-Semitism where there’s none,” said the board member.
Although Layla says the threats are not affecting her end-of-year examinations, she experiences harassment from some Jewish pupils. “Sometimes they throw balls at me,” she said.
Hassan Cassim believes that the school has failed Layla and has accused it of not informing pupils that Layla was asked to write from a Palestinian perspective.
“Crawford College’s failure to effectively manage the situation put my daughter’s life at risk and in the hands of an extremist group,” said Hassan Cassim.
“The Jewish Defence League could only have obtained my residential address from school records – Crawford College has thus violated my right to privacy and placed my family at risk,” he said.
The headmaster of Crawford College, Rod Conacher, refused to comment on the matter.
“It would not be a wise thing to do,” he said. “I don’t think it is in her best interests.”