CAIR-CA Joins California Palestine Solidarity Coalition on State Capitol Advocacy Day
Sacramento: On August 6, 2024, the California chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-CA) joined the California Palestine Solidarity Coalition in its participation in State Capitol Advocacy Day events.
The group met with elected officials to discuss their concerns about legislation that threatens to undermine fair and unbiased education about Palestine and restrict pro-Palestinian advocacy in California’s public schools and universities.
The coalition specifically opposes Senate bills 1277 and 1287, and Assembly bills 2918 and 2925, which falsely equate criticism of Zionism and Israel with antisemitism and seek to shift control of educational content away from experienced educators to biased groups.
SB1277 places control of genocide education curricula in the hands of the California Teachers Collaborative for Holocaust and Genocide Education led by pro-Israel organizations.
SB1287 aims to silence university and college students who express opinions in support of Palestine. It aims to restrict and suppress the First Amendment rights of students to free speech and assembly on California campuses.
AB2918 proposes additional state oversight that would remove curriculum development from ethnic studies educators, placing it instead with groups that have little to no knowledge of ethnic studies, but do have an anti-Palestinian bias. In addition, the bill infringes on students’ access to the free exchange of ideas, a core tenant of a university or college education.
AB2925 seeks to control discrimination training on campuses, focusing on specific groups based on law enforcement databases, under a definition of antisemitism aligned with pro-Israel agendas.
Members of the Arab Resource and Organizing Center (AROC), the CA Coalition for Liberated Ethnic Studies, Jewish Voice for Peace, and other community advocates also attended the meetings with California legislators at the state Capitol.
(Elaine Pasquini is a freelance journalist. Her reports appear in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs and Nuze.Ink.)
