Some 250 Jews and non-Jews took part today in a 90-minute demonstration in front of City Board of Education headquarters in Brooklyn in protest against the appointment of Luis Fuentes, who has been charged with anti-Semitic remarks and slurs on other groups, as superintendent of the Community School of District One on Manhattan’s Lower East Side.
The demonstrators, led by B’nai B’rith protesters, also included representatives of the Italian-American coalition, the Jewish War Veterans and some Puerto Ricans, who asked to be allowed to participate. Also present were a number of elected officials, including Rep. Mario Biaggi and James Scheuer, Bronx Democrats, and City Councilmen Leonard Silverman and Monroe Cohen.
The Congressmen told newsmen at the scene they were strongly opposed to the Fuentes appointment. Asked what he could do about the disputed appointment, Rep. Biaggi said he was a member of a committee “which supplies funds to carry out school programs” and that he would seek to determine “what can be done from that end.” B’nai B’rith officials said this was the first time members had participated in a street demonstration of this kind, having marched before in behalf of Israel, Soviet Jewry and related issues. The American Jewish Committee, the American Jewish Congress, and the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith announced previously they were investigating legal recourse against the Fuentes appointment, which might be open to them, if such action becomes necessary.
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