A girls’ public high school basketball coach and one of the team’s players have been fired after antisemitic comments were allegedly made to the opposing private Jewish school team during a game last week, according to a statement from the school system and the mayor of Yonkers, New York.
The incident happened during a game on Thursday between the girls’ varsity teams from The Leffell School, a private Jewish school in Hartsdale, and Roosevelt High School Early College Studies, a public school in Yonkers.
During the third quarter, members of The Leffell School team became injured after what Leffell player Robin Bosworth described as “the other team’s physical style of play” according to an op-ed for her online school newspaper, The Lion’s Roar.
Players on the opposing team then began shouting “antisemitic slurs and curses at us,” Bosworth wrote, adding the Leffell School team ended the game early, after the third quarter.
An investigation was then launched, resulting in the firing of a coach and a player, neither of whom has been identified.
The investigation is still ongoing, officials said, adding that other people possibly involved could be disciplined.
In a statement, Yonkers Public Schools apologised for the incident, calling the comments “abhorrent, inappropriate and not in line with the values we set forth for our young people.”
“The Yonkers Public Schools along with the City of Yonkers sincerely apologize to the students and community of The Leffell School for the painful and offensive comments made to their women’s basketball team during a recent game with Roosevelt High School- Early College Studies,” Yonkers Public Schools Interim Superintendent Luis Rodriguez and Mayor Mike Spano said.
“Collectively, we do not and will not tolerate hate speech of any kind from our students and community. The antisemitic rhetoric reportedly made against the student athletes of The Leffell School are abhorrent, inappropriate and not in line with the values we set forth for our young people.”
New York Governor Kathy Hochul condemned the incident— (Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.)
Restoration efforts between Yonkers Public Schools and The Leffell School are now underway, officials added.
Following the incident, which came amid a spike in antisemitic incidents in the US following the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war, students and officials were quick to condemn the comments, which Bosworth said “should not be tolerated or forgotten immediately.”
“Attacking a team because of their school’s religious association is never acceptable, but especially due to the current war in Israel and the world’s rise in antisemitism, this felt extremely personal to me and many members of my team,” Bosworth wrote.
New York Governor Kathy Hochul on Saturday shared a link to a news story about the incident on X, formerly known as Twitter, noting: “A high school basketball game. This cannot be who we are as New Yorkers. No one should ever be subjected to antisemitism or any kind of hate.”
In the month since the 7 October attacks, the Anti-Defamation League said it had recorded a “significant spike in antisemitic incidents”.
And between 7 October and 7 December, antisemitic incidents reached the highest level ever for a two-month period since the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) began tracking the figure back in 1979, topping 2,000.
Meanwhile, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights organisation, said it had received 2,171 requests for help between 7 October and 7 December.
