Long Beach City College trustees voted to recognize May as Jewish American Heritage Month alongside Asian, Pacific Islander and Desi Heritage Month on Wednesday night, following a slew of public comments in support of the Jewish American Heritage Month.
During the trustee comment portion of the resolution, trustee member Sunny Zia spoke at length about her support for this type of recognition for the Jewish community.
“It is important as one of your two Jewish elected officials in Long Beach for me personally to have this representation,” Zia said.
The trustee emphasized her belief in this resolution, seven months after the Oct. 7 escalation in the Israel-Hamas conflict.
“Many of you have been going through this shared trauma that we have been experiencing since Oct. 7, the second-worst tragedy since we had the Holocaust, some of the things that have been said have been not just derogatory and offensive but misinformation about our community and it has been proliferating,” said Zia.
Zia then continued to give her own personal experiences with the conflict.
“When Hamas attacked our communities, I had loved ones in Sderot that I couldn’t get a hold of. Imagine if it was your kin, just forget about Jewish, Arab, American, Iranian, who I am one, imagine you can’t hold a of your loved ones, and finally they are accounted for, and that has been our experience, it is an experience of trauma and retraumatization,” Zia said.
Members of Jewish Long Beach’s board of directors attended the meeting to express their support for LBCC trustees move to recognize Jewish American Heritage Month, including director at-large Ken Schlesinger and Anna Salusky, vice president of programs for Jewish Long Beach.
“What you are doing here tonight sends a message that it is important that we all are treated with dignity and respect and I feel very lucky to be part of such a diverse community here in Long Beach where we can embrace not only our similarities but our differences as well,” Salusky said.
Before Salusky, Schlesinger took to the podium to thank the board of trustees for recognition of the Jewish community in Long Beach.
“The resolution recognizing May as Jewish American Heritage Month comes at a significantly challenging time for American Jews and those living around the world. We are living in unimaginable times,” Schlesinger said.
Schlesinger also acknowledged the growing reports of Jewish college students and faculty facing discrimination amidst growing tensions over the Israel-Hamas conflict.
“The extreme challenges that American Jewsih college students, faculty and staff across the country confront daily is beyond unacceptable. No American, Jewish or otherwise should be harassed or denied the ability to learn, teach or to do their job freely and effectively,” said Schlesinger.
All trustees voted in favor of the resolution with little discussion after Zia’s comments. They then went down to the meeting room floor to take photos with community members involved with pushing the resolution, proudly displaying the flag of Israel while they posed.
The board of trustees will meet again on June 26 in room T-1100.