A high school girls' basketball game in Yonkers, New York, was abruptly ended on Thursday after players on the home team hurled antisemitic slurs at their Jewish opponents, who ultimately needed security guards to escort them off the court to safety.

Members of Leffell School, a private Jewish school in Hartsdale, NY, faced "substantially more jabs and comments" than they had "experienced in the past."  

“I support Hamas, you f–king Jew,” a Roosevelt player hurled at a Leffell player, according to The New York City Public Schools Alliance, a group of parents and teachers fighting antisemitism.

This incident was beyond troubling, given that the offending members of the Roosevelt High School team likely had little or no knowledge or understanding of the history of the Middle East — and, one would hope, given some of the disgusting slurs, of Hamas — and were simply parroting left-wing bigotry that they picked up from others.

Senior Leffell player Robin Bosworth wrote in an op-ed for the school's student newspaper, "The Lion’s Roar":

Throughout the first half of our game against Roosevelt High School in Yonkers, there was a somewhat hostile environment, with substantially more jabs and comments thrown at the players on our team than what I have experienced in the past. Despite this, our team chose to let their aggressiveness fuel us going into the second half of the game, as we continued to play passionately. 

However, all of that changed in the third quarter. Members of our team started to get injured from the other team’s physical style of play. At the end of the quarter, players on the opposing team started shouting “Free Palestine” and other antisemitic slurs and curses at us. 

Attacking a team because of their school’s religious association is never acceptable, but especially due to the current war in Israel and the world’s rise in antisemitism, this felt extremely personal to me and many members of my team. I have played a sport every athletic season throughout my high school career, and I have never experienced this kind of hatred directed at one of my teams before.

Instead of responding to hatred with more of the same, we chose to separate ourselves from the situation and leave with dignity and pride in who we are and what we believe in.

At the end of the third quarter, Lions head coach John Tessitore consulted with his team and decided to end the game, according to Michael Kay, the head of school for Leffell.

Our team was playing on the road, and during the course of the game, a small number of players on the opposing team directed hurtful, antisemitic comments toward members of our team.

Kay added that Roosevelt’s athletic director Kyle Calabro has since apologized and said “the follow-up would be swift and appropriate.” 

However, on Friday, Roosevelt principal Edward DeChent also apologized to Kay and described the “investigative steps” that had been taken, and “outlined a number of disciplinary consequences and educational responses,” including the possibility of an in-person meeting between the teams. Yeah, I'm still skeptical.

Incidentally, at the end of the game, Leffell players decided to line up and shake hands with Roosevelt players for winning the game, wrote Bosworth — which didn't sit well with her.

At the end of a basketball game, it is customary to shake hands with every member of the opposing team, to signify that everything that happened during the game was in fact just a part of the game. Despite our conflicting feelings about this practice, every member of my team acted with respect and class and lined up to shake their hands. 

However, being forced to shake hands with and say “good game” to people who had expressed such hatred did not sit right with me afterwards. If a team shows blatant disrespect towards my team and our school community’s values, it should not be tolerated or forgotten immediately following the game. 

I'm with Robin Boswell. No way would I have shaken hands with an opponent who had called me a "f***ing Jew" if I were a Leffell player. 

Then again, I understand the incredible grace — and I admire it, tremendously.