As the controversy spread across social media Thursday afternoon, Fair Lawn High School received dozens of calls and e-mails from Palestinian rights activists.
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Koval is a student at the suburban Fair Lawn High School in New Jersey, home to some of the country’s toughest anti-bullying laws thanks to the suicide of a Rutgers University freshman in 2010. “I’m so FREE now like…[expletive] ISRAEL”.
On Dec. 27, she wrote: “But actually I can get in a LOT of trouble with my school for my anti-Israel sentiments on here A girl I know got in trouble for a [Black Lives Matter] post”.
Recently on December 23 she expressed joy because another student who does not share her views unfollowed her. Then apparently wrote another message threatening to name that student.
“Just couldn’t make it through the school day”, she said in a tweet. Zuniga tweeted about her class’s decision to send cards to Mumia.
When she arrived at the principal’s office Thursday morning, Koval was told – in conversations she recorded – that her electronic record could result in serious legal consequences. When Bethany returned to school she had to meet with the principal and took to Twitter to talk about it. “I’m about to be exposed for being anti-Israel”.
“You are talking about her to someone else”, the administrator said. “There’s a state law that might interpret it differently”.
An assistant principal at Fair Lawn High told Bethany Koval, 16, on Wednesday that she could be formally charged under New Jersey’s Anti-Bullying Bill of Rights Act, which could lead to suspension or expulsion from school, the Gothamist reported.
“We stress at the outset that at no time have district officials sought to censor or reprimand any pupils for their online speech”, Superintendent Bruce Watson said in a written statement to the newspaper.
Koval is a prolific Twitter user.
After Koval was briefly dismissed, she was called back to write a statement on the events that transpired.
Many followers expressed solidarity with the hashtag #IStandWithBenny.
Koval defined why she believes Israel’s occupation of Palestine should be considered apartheid, and decried both the slaying of the Palestinian Dawabsheh family in an arson and the later stabbing of a photo of the Dawabsheh’s toddler by Israelis at a wedding party in an illegal settlement.
“My mom wants this whole thing to slow down, and so I must stay silent for a while”.
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She was later told that she could rescind her original statement and write a new one, The Gothamist reports. Going straight to an investigation may feel like the “better safe than sorry” option, but that shouldn’t be the default.
