A Staten Island eighth-grader brazenly waved a Palestinian flag at his middle-school graduation, sparking outrage after he defied a school directive.
The pupil accepted his diploma onstage at Elias Bernstein IS 7 in Huguenot on Monday and unfurled the flag as he walked off the stage, video of the ceremony shows.
A handful in the crowd of hundreds cheered while the majority loudly booed, immediately fracturing the event.
One furious grandmother declared that her granddaughter’s graduation day was “ruined” because of the selfish stunt.
“Children are a product of their parents. These children all worked hard for this day,” she wrote on Facebook.
“For many Jewish families in attendance, this felt like a political and intimidating message that had no place at a middle school graduation during this political climate,” one parent wrote in a message posted to Instagram by advocacy group NYC Public School Alliance.
The student wasn’t removed from the ceremony after displaying the flag and school staff continued reading off the names of graduates amid the commotion.
“There needs to be a true and meaningful consequence for unruly and disruptive behavior at any graduation ceremony,” said Borough President Vito Fossella.
School officials sent notices to parents before the ceremony that political displays of any kind are forbidden.
“It seems that his parents encouraged the boy to do it,” Fossella said. The Post has reached out to the boy’s parents.
Critics across the city slammed the school for letting the student, whose name is being withheld because he’s a minor, get away with it.
“Too late should have been handled with right on the spot !!” one woman wrote online.
Others emphasized that a graduation is not the time to make a “political statement.”
“There should be only one flag flying at a graduation ceremony,” another commenter wrote with an American flag emoji.
Moshe Spern, the president of the United Jewish Teachers, said the silence from the Department of Education is deafening.
“Graduations should celebrate achievement and not push divisive political statements, especially in a city still healing from antisemitic violence,” he wrote on X.
“Where is the accountability from @NYCSchools Chancellor & @DOEChancellor? This directly violates guidance for neutral, inclusive ceremonies.”
The DOE did not respond to a request for comment.
Still, some sided with the student, saying he was merely exercising his freedom of speech.
“I guess freedom of speech doesn’t count when it isn’t speech that you agree with, does it,” one man wrote on Facebook.
Dr. Carole Lieberman, a psychiatrist who wrote two books on terrorism, said the incident was hardly a youthful prank.
“Students using graduation ceremonies as opportunities to intimidate others by waving Palestinian flags, or carrying antisemitic and anti-Israel signs, or changing their pre-approved graduation speeches to promote their Islamic beliefs, are doing no less than waging jihad,” she told The Post.
“These rebellious acts have continued – and will continue – as long as teachers and principals do nothing out of belief in the antisemitic/anti-Israel cause, or because they’re cowards.”
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