Mick Hartley

The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI), based in LA, is the only worldwide professional organization for children’s book authors and illustrators. A couple of weeks back it published a Facebook post condemning antisemitism, acknowledging that Jews “have the right to life, safety, and freedom from scapegoating and fear”, and lamenting the current rise in antisemitic violence:

“Silence is often mistaken for acceptance and results in the perpetration of more hatred and violence against different types of people. As proof, it saddens us that for the fourth time this year we are compelled to invite you to join us in not looking away and in speaking out against all forms of hate, including antisemitism."

Well, obviously, that will never do. What about the Palestinians? From the Algemeiner:

On Sunday, SCBWI executive director Lin Oliver issued an apology, saying, “I would like to apologize to everyone in the Palestinian community who felt unrepresented, silenced, or marginalized. SCBWI acknowledges the pain our actions have caused to our Muslim and Palestinian members and hope that we can heal from this moment.”

Oliver also apologized to a Palestinian-American writer whose social media comments about the SCBWI statement had been removed, and said that the writer had been unblocked from the group’s feed.

Oliver said that Chief Equity and Inclusion Officer April Powers, who issued the statement, had resigned; that board seats and Equity and Inclusion Committee slots would be created for Muslim members; and the committee would review its “policies regarding freedom of expression for all underrepresented members to make sure no one is silenced or unsafe.”

The message included an apology from Powers herself, who said she had erred in removing “anti-Palestinian and anti-Israeli posts.”

“I neglected to address the rise in Islamophobia, and deeply regret that omission,” she added. “As someone who is vehemently against Islamophobia and hate speech of any kind, I understand that intention is not impact and I am so sorry.”

“While this doesn’t fix the pain and disappointment that you feel by my mishandling of this moment, I hope you will accept my sincerest apologies and resignation from the SCBWI,” Powers said. “I wish all of you success in your work because the world’s children need your stories. All of them.”

It's an interesting comment on Palestinian sensitivities – that they'll be offended by any condemnation of antisemitism.

Yair Rosenberg on Twitter:

This looks VERY bad. On June 10, after anti-Jewish crimes spiked, the Black Jewish diversity officer for the Society of Children's Book Writers & Illustrators @scbwi posted a condemnation of antisemitism. Today, she was fired, apparently for not mentioning Islamophobia? Yikes. pic.twitter.com/qwYAFKKlWp

— Yair Rosenberg (@Yair_Rosenberg) June 28, 2021

https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

Update: more here. Apparently a writer with a history of antisemitic statements on Twitter forced the issue, and the SCBWI caved in:

A writer named Razan Abdin-Adnani began replying to the statement on Twitter with anti-Israel propaganda, justifying violence against Jews worldwide by hurling baseless accusations against the Jewish state. She also demanded that the organization issue a statement about Islamophobia in her tweets replying to SCBWI’s statement on antisemitism, essentially "all lives mattering" the issue.

She harassed the account so often that the statement condemning antisemitism had to be deleted and reposted 4 times before the Chief Equity and Inclusion Officer April Powers blocked Abdin-Adnani.

Abdin-Adnani went on to harass and dox Powers on her social media platforms.

On June 22, Abdin-Adnani wrote a 31 post Twitter thread/manifesto retconning the events that had transpired and included her thoughts about being dismayed when SCBWI released a powerful statement in support of the Jewish community. Abdin-Adnani claimed "I left an affirmative and polite comment on SCBWI’s Twitter," but at no point does she admit that this comment was followed by dozens more, including antisemitic statements, on the original SCBWI statements condemning anti-Semitism.

Such as, for instance: “Zionists need to go back to Europe and Brooklyn. I hear Germany and Poland are quite nice these days.”

In response, SCBWI posted their statement apologising to Abdin-Adnani by name, removed the block on her, and asked April Powers, who is black and Jewish, to resign.