Two members of a three-judge federal appellate court panel took the city to task yesterday for removing the principal of the Khalil Gibran International Academy. Debbie Almontaser, who helped found the dual-language school with an emphasis on Arab culture, stepped down before the school opened last fall, after controversy over remarks she made in the NY Post. Last summer, Almontaser had commented on t-shirts with "intifada" printed on them, made by a youth group she......

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a possible abduction on Warwick St. and Livonia Ave. in Brooklyn, a police involved shooting on West Kingsbridge Rd. in the Bronx, and an abduction on 33rd St. and 5th Ave. in Manhattan. A contestant on Deal or No Deal from Bayonne, NJ tells host Howie Mandel that the godawful smell around there is from the dump on Staten Island. Residents of Richmond County are not amused. Two pitbulls,......

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: an unusual elevator rescue on Washington Ave. in Brooklyn, a pipe explosion on Richmond Terrace on Staten Island, and a person fatally struck by an A train at Van Siclen and Pitken Ave. in Brooklyn. NYC already has 91,000 practicing attorneys, but we can expect a lot more. Nearly 11,000 freshly minted JDs sat for the bar this summer and more than 70% of them passed. A 63-year-old man......

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a construction accident on 23rd Ave. in Queens, a child was struck on West Houston and Thompson St. in Manhattan, and shots fired on 29th St. in Brooklyn. Going along with a network-wide environmentally conscious theme at NBC this season, the Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center will be decorated with low power-consuming LEDs. The flat rate for a single subway fare will remain $2 until 2009. The fares will......

Debbie Almontaser, the erstwhile head and founder of Brooklyn's Khalil Gibran International Academy, will sue the city for violating her freedom of speech. She also claims Mayor Bloomberg and Schools Chancellor Joel Klein forced her to resign as principal under threat of closing the dual-language school. The KGIA, named after the Lebanese Christian poet, teaches students Arabic and English and aims to foster cross-cultural understanding, but critics accused Almontaser of establishing a madrassa to indoctrinate......

The Khalil Gibran International Academy––a new bi-lingual school dedicated to teaching children Arabic and instructing students about Middle Eastern history––received a new principal after the abrupt departure of its founder Debbie Almontaser in a flap over a t-shirt. The new interim principal is Danielle Salzberg, who is an Orthodox Jewish woman that has been working with the Dept. of Education to establish the Khalil Gibran school. The school's founder stepped down last week after she......

Debbie Almontaser, the erstwhile founder and principal of the Khalil Gibran International Academy, resigned this week after controversy arose over a t-shirt. With less than a month before kids report to school, Almontaser resigned when she failed to initially denounce a t-shirt that was being sold by a group called Arab Women Active in Arts and Media that read "Intifada NYC". Almontaser said that the word "intifada" literally meant "shrugging off" in Arabic and was......

The NYCLU and ACLU are suing the Transportation Security Administration and Jet Blue over an incident where a passenger was forced to cover/change his shirt, which had Arabic lettering. Last year, Reid Jarrar, an American resident of Iraqi descent, was taking a JetBlue flight at JFK when a TSA official asked him to over his shirt, which read "We Will Not Be Silent" in both English and Arabic. The shirt's message is taken from the......

One of the 40 new schools the city is opening in the fall will be the first public school dedicated teaching the Arabic language and culture. The NY Times reports that half of the classes at the Khalil Gibran International Academy will eventually be taught in Arabic. It will be located in Brooklyn, though it's unclear where yet. Principal Debbie Almontaser says the school will start out with just sixth graders, but will eventually have......