Join the FUSD Middle East Justice Project!
On Sunday, September 6, from 12-1 pm in the Chapel, following Sunday service, stay for an interactive teach-in to learn more about what is happening on the ground and the shifts in American politics regarding Palestine.
Our teach-in facilitators:
Michael Kengmana is a special education teacher, born and raised in New York City, where he has spent most of his life. He has taught in public schools in New York City, in nonprofit programs supporting adults in learning English and improving their literacy skills, and in summer programs for high schoolers in Palestine. He is currently teaching as a special education learning specialist at a high school here in Denver. Michael was also recently ordained as a Rabbi in December 2024 and continues to learn more about the meaning of spirituality in the times we live in. He hopes to weave his experiences teaching and learning into the work of creating a Judaism beyond Zionism as part of the larger human work of building a more caring and compassionate world that remembers to include everyone.
Karim Mattar is an Associate Professor of English at the University of Colorado at Boulder. A descendant of survivors of the 1948 Palestinian Nakba, he works at the intersection of Palestine studies, the humanities, and higher education. He is currently at work on Writing the Catastrophe: Trauma and Responsibility Across Generations, a book that interweaves personal experience, family history, cultural critique, and political analysis to tell a multigenerational, transcontinental story of responsibility to Palestine, with a special emphasis on American higher education during the genocide. Also a dedicated community organizer, Karim works at the local, state, and national levels to enhance public awareness and understanding of Palestinian literature, history, and politics and to advocate for the liberation of Palestine.