[Order Michael Finch’s new book, A Time to Stand: HERE. Prof. Jason Hill calls it “an aesthetic and political tour de force.”]

In a disgusting display of how anti-Semitism has filtered from our universities down to our K-12 schools, a group of students from Branham High School in San Jose, California were revealed to have posed for a photo shoot using their bodies to construct a ‘human swastika’ on the school football field. The students then posted the image to social media alongside a quote from Nazi leader Adolf Hitler.

The photo is not subtle. It features eight students, who all appear to be male, lying on the grass of the football field. Four of their bodies are used to form the inner core of the ‘crooked cross’ while the remaining four students form the outer bent arms of the swastika.

Branham High’s mascot, a bruin bear, painted in blue and white on the grass of the football field, is clearly visible just beyond the hateful symbol. It seems obvious that a good deal of forethought and planning went into executing the anti-Semitic stunt.

The photo was then shared to Instagram with the following quote from Adolf Hitler: “I want to be a prophet again today. If international financial Jews inside and outside Europe were to succeed in plunging nations into a world war once again, the result will not be Bolshevization of the earth and thus a victory for Judaism, but the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe. The world may laugh at this statement; many laughed at my words back then. But time will show that there is more truth to this prophecy than today’s adversaries can love. Nations will rise against those who push them into conflict, chaos and destruction.”

The quote is taken from Hitler’s January 1939 speech before the German Reichstag in which he addressed the “Jewish Question” and attempted to lay blame for the coming world war on the Jewish people even as Germany made plans to invade Poland later that same year. The Simon Weisenthal Center labeled this particular Hitler speech “one of his most infamous addresses, in which he threatened ‘the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe’”—a promise that he later attempted to fulfill through the ‘final solution’ of concentration camps and gas chambers.

Branham High school administrators were first notified of the photo through an anonymous tip line on December 3^rd and began investigating its origins. The Instagram post and the account which had shared it were taken down two days later.

“Our message to the community is clear: this was a disturbing and unacceptable act of antisemitism. Actions that target, demean, or threaten Jewish students have no place at Branham,” commented school principal Beth Silbergeld. “Many in our community were rightly appalled by the image. Personally, I am horrified by this act. Professionally, I am confident and hopeful that our school community can learn from this moment and emerge stronger and more united.”

While refusing to identify the students involved or comment on specific disciplinary procedures, Principal Silbergeld promised “justice.”

“We are responding in accordance with education code and our district’s commitment to restorative justice,” she said in a statement. “The students who were involved are committed to taking accountability for the harm that was done.”

While the Branham High administration appears to be saying and doing all the right things in response to this outrageous and defiant act of Jew hatred on school property, one must question how such casual and gleeful anti-Semitism found its way into a prestigious Silicon Valley high school.

A casual perusal of the Branham High Instagram page gives the impression of an all-American multicultural experience, with posts highlighting holiday toy drives, student concerts, and sporting events. But lurking beneath this polished veneer, a disgusting well of Jew hatred has been brewing.

This past April, the California Department of Education concluded that two ethnic studies teachers at Branham High violated the state’s education code and discriminated against Jewish students.

In one class, the ethnic studies teacher (described as “Teacher A” in the Department of Education’s report) led a “community circle” during which they showed students an extremely biased video featuring Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss  who “gives his explanation of the difference between Judaism and Zionism and is seen wearing a Palestinian flag that says, ‘A Jew is not a Zionist’ and below the Palestinian flag is an Israeli flag with a red cross over the Star of David.”

Students in this same class were then treated to an electronic slideshow which, among other things, quoted radical philosopher Paulo Freire, author of Pedagogy of the Oppressed, who wrote:

“But almost always, during the initial stage of the struggle, the oppressed, instead of striving for liberation, tend themselves to become oppressors, or ‘sub-oppressors.’ The very structure of their thought has been conditioned by the contradictions of the concrete, existential situation by which they were shaped. Their ideal is to be [human]; but for them, to be [human] is to be oppressors. This is their model of humanity. This phenomenon derives from the fact that the oppressed, at a certain moment of their existential experience, adopt an attitude of ‘adhesion’ to the oppressor.”

Students were shown this quote and then asked, “How can Paulo Freire’s theoretical approach to oppressors/oppressed, humanization and dehumanization help us understand what is going on between Israel and Palestine?”

The ‘correct’ answer demanded by the biased lesson is obvious. The Jews, because they suffered oppression in the Holocaust, have now become ‘sub-oppressors’ of the Palestinians and are therefore at fault in the conflict in Gaza.

As the California Department of Education rightfully concluded, the lesson was extremely one sided and violated state education law which states that “A teacher shall not give instruction . . . that promotes a discriminatory bias on the basis of race or ethnicity.”

In another instance of illegal discrimination, a second ethnic studies teacher at Branham High (dubbed “Teacher B” in the report) allowed a group of students to conduct a class project on genocide which highlighted the “Genocide of Palestinians.” The project was presented as a slideshow in class and then posted immediately after to the teacher’s social media account on Ethnic Literature.

“It was Teacher B’s responsibility, once the slide was presented, to respond appropriately, so as not to allow it to become a hostile environment for the students,” determined the California Department of Education. “By Teacher B not commenting on the slide regarding Palestinian genocide, it could have been interpreted by the student audience as approval of the presented thesis.”

The ‘human swastika’ at Branham High School is an outrageous act of Jew hatred. But it is also a tragedy. The students who undertook this malevolent act were not born as anti-Semites; they were made. The fervor of Jew hate emanating from our college campuses and largest cities, the reluctance of public officials to openly condemn it by name, and the slanted education provided by Branham High’s own faculty have combined to form a toxic atmosphere that inspires adolescents to worship Hitler.  We must hold the authorities to account for the mess they have created. If we fail, Hitler’s prognostication of the “annihilation of the Jewish race” will be all too real.