The Jersey City Board of Education will hold a special meeting to consider whether to reprimand Vice President Younass Barkouch, who witnesses say shouted “from the river to the sea” during the April 25th meeting when students were honoring National Arab American Heritage Month.

Jersey City Board of Education President Dejon Morris said, “we denounce that statement … I, as the president and the board, we do not endorse that statement at all.”

“From the river to the sea” is seen by some as antisemitic, symbolizing Palestinian control over the entire territory of Israel’s borders, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, which would erase Israel. The phrase has been used by Hamas as well as American college students protesting the Israel-Hamas war.

On Monday the Jersey City Jewish Association sent a letter to the Board of Education, calling Barkouch’s language antisemitic, saying it “has the potential to incite unrest and jeopardize the safety and multicultural balance of our diverse educational system,” and asking for an apology: “We urge the BOE president, as the spokesperson for the board, to issue a statement denouncing this behavior and clarifying that it does not align with the BOE’s views.”

President Morris has his own woes. In February, his first year on the board, he was elected president in a coup that ousted then-President Natalia Ioffe and Vice President Noemi Velazquez;’ Barkouch was elected vice-president. At that meeting two board members and Superintendent Norma Fernandez walked out.

The Jersey Journal: “Just a year and a half out of state control, it’s beyond scandalous that Jersey City’s public schools are in this situation, especially at this time of year when the board should be carefully reviewing the district’s $1 billion – you read that right – budget.”

Former Gov. Jim McGreevey (who is running for Jersey City mayor): “The actions of recent weeks are not representative of a normal board of education and school system and starkly demonstrate that our present school district is not functioning properly.”

In Jersey City Public Schools District, 73 percent of fourth-graders are not proficient in reading and 90 percent of eighth-graders are not proficient in math. McGreevey calculates (a bit hyperbolically) that the billion dollar budget means the district is spending $36,062 for each of its 28,707 students, more than Newark or Elizabeth, New Jersey’s two larger school districts.