An Arabic-speaking family assaulted a Jewish mother and her husband at an elementary-school graduation in Brooklyn last weekend while shouting “Free Palestine,” “Gaza is ours,” and “Death to Israel,” the New York Post reported on Sunday.
At PS 682, the Jewish mother by the name of Lana told the Post that a man identified as Ez-Al Dean Bazar sucker punched her husband, Johan, before putting him in a choke hold. The attack came after Lana and her family were pushed away from a photograph site by the Arabic-speaking family.
“A woman from the group came up behind me, pulled me by the hair, and knocked me down on the ground, shouting ‘I will kill you,'” Lana added.
While the school did not have any security present, two male teachers ultimately broke up the fight.
While Lana may not be visibly Jewish — she does not wear any articles of clothing or accessories that indicate her Judaism — her children are outspoken about their Jewish roots. In its report, the Post included a photograph of a drawing her son had made in an art class that included a Star of David.
“They targeted my family because we are Jewish,” Lana said, and “a graduation that was supposed to be joyous and memorable turned into a violent and traumatizing one.” She told the Post that her ten-year-old twins witnessed the assault.
A spokesperson for the New York City public-school system issued a statement, saying that “both families engaged in aggressive behavior,” a characterization that Lana and Johan disputed.
Lana told the Post that school officials were “trying to sweep it under the rug to avoid further scrutiny of this heinous antisemitic act.”
Bazar, the alleged assailant, was arrested and released on his own recognizance, and the New York Police Department did not classify the assault as a hate crime, something with which Lana has taken issue given the chants the Arabic-speaking family shouted at her and her husband.