By Lee Moran New York Daily News
The Texas teacher is also under fire for encouraging students to dress in Islamic clothing and telling teens to stop referring to the Holocaust as ‘genocide.’
The 9/11 hijackers should be called “freedom fighters” and not “suicide bombers” or “terrorists” – according to a geography teacher at one Texas school.
Lumberton High is also under fire for telling teens to stop labeling the Holocaust as genocide but instead refer to it as “ethnic cleansing.”
The teacher, who has not been named, also encouraged students to dress in Islamic clothing – with a photo of five female students donning burkas being posted on Facebook.
The controversial teachings have sparked outrage among parents.
April LeBlanc told Fox News the school was “saturating these kids in Islam,” adding that it was “scary how far they dove into the Islamic faith.”
LeBlanc, whose 15-year-old daughter Madelyn appeared in the burka photo, said she felt betrayed by the school district.
She added: “My biggest thing is not the burka. That was the key to opening up the rest. […]It’s scary what they taught my daughter. Who’s in charge of this?”
State Sen. Dan Patrick also said he was “disturbed” by the photograph.
He added he was looking into reports students were told to write about a Washington Post article that blamed Egypt’s turmoil on democracy rather than the Muslim Brotherhood.
Patrick told Fox: “Parents are very sensitive to any issue that seems to be anti-American – that blames democracy for some sort of trouble in the world.”
But the teacher, a 32-year veteran, has the backing of Lumberton Independent School District, with superintendent John Valastro saying he “has done nothing wrong.”
Valastro, who denied the teacher was trying to radicalize students, said it was important for children to understand context.
He said: “We might see it as terrorism, but from the Islamic side they might call it jihadist or freedom fighter.”
