A heartbreaking photo of a 12-year-old Jew student kneeling and kissing the shoe of a Muslim boy surfaced recently and people were left disgusted both at the bullies and the society that lacks to provide support for students who fall victims to anti-Semitic or any other form of bullying related to their race, fate, or beliefs.
It was reported that the Jew boy was forced to kiss the other boy’s shoe or he would be severely beaten from the group of Muslim boys who circled him after they stumbled upon him at the local park.
The Age reported that for now, no bully faced any disciplinary measure.
No matter how sad that sounds, this isn’t the first reported case of bullying of Jewish students only because they are Jews.
5-year-old boy was called names such as ‘Jewish cockroach’ and ‘dirty Jew’ and was mocked for being circumcised to the extent that he refused to go to the bathroom and would soil his pants instead.
The parents of both these bullied children asked from the schools and the community to step in and stand for their kids, but as that didn’t happen, they were forced to draw them from the educational institutions they attended.
The mother of the 12-year-old victim says that she contacted the parents of the Muslim boy and they were extremely sorry and incredibly disappointed in their son’s action.
“We sat down, his parents, the two boys and myself, around the table and explained the velocity of [the bullying] and what it meant to us as parents as far as building bridges between Jews and Muslims in society and not creating division like that photo does,” the mother of one of the bullies said.
After the school refused to take any action saying the incident didn’t took place on the school’s ground, the mother of the bullied 12-year-old Jew student said, “I took such offence with the Education Department, because there was nothing they did to protect my son at all, at any point in time – that’s what’s cut me up,’ she said.
The mother of the five-year-old boy who was bullied and called names shared the heartbreaking story of how it all affected her lovely child and how it crushed his self-esteem. Speaking to Australian Jewish News, she said, “He literally fell down on the floor and said, ‘Mumy, you shouldn’t love me. I’m a worthless, Jewish rodent. I’m vermin.'”
She tried to find a solution that would help put an end to her son’s bullying regarding the incidents taking place in the bathroom, but the school just said that he should use a separate bathroom instead the one that everyone uses.
She then suggested that the students get educated about antisemitism, but her suggestion was rejected in an instant.
“It’s not anti-Semitism, it’s just bullying. I don’t want to make other students feel uncomfortable,” the school principal said.
The school issued a statement writing, “While school staff were not able to substantiate that any negative interactions were anti-Semitic in nature, on the basis of those investigations, school staff identified an incident that involved children laughing at [the boy].”
‘This was not acceptable and would have been an unpleasant experience for [the boy]. I am sorry that this occurred.”
Both the parents of the bullied boys and representatives of the Australia’s Anti-Defamation Commission agree that this bullying should be stopped and no other Jewish person should ever feel bad for being a Jew.
They urge the Government and the school system to put an effort to deal with the sad phenomenon of these students having to undergo ordeals and be subjected to violence, verbal insults, and social exclusion.