'Here, Islam is the boss': The nightmare of a gay Jewish teacher in Berlin’s migrant schools

[duluxe]

Uziel Inácio-Steck recounts a harrowing experience of harassment and isolation, exposing systemic failures in immigrant-heavy schools where conservative Muslim values clash with German liberalism​

What began as a mission of inclusion for Uziel Inácio-Steck, a 43-year-old Jewish gay teacher from Brazil, ended in isolation, harassment and trauma. His story—reported by Thorsten Schmitz in Germany’s Süddeutsche Zeitung—sheds light on what many educators describe as the failure of integration in some of Berlin’s immigrant-heavy neighborhoods.
According to the report, Inácio-Steck moved to Berlin in 2010 and has taught for nine years at the Karl-Bolle elementary school in Moabit, a working-class district of 85,000 residents.
About 95% of the school's students are from immigrant families, largely from Lebanon, Afghanistan, Iraq and the Palestinian territories. Most come from conservative households where homosexuality is taboo—or outright illegal.
Though he kept both his Jewish identity and sexual orientation private for years, Inácio-Steck eventually told students he was married to a man. That revelation triggered what he called a "nightmare."
Students mocked him, refused to share classrooms or food with him and called him “filthy.” One student shouted, “You’re gay? I’m going to tell the whole school,” while others told him he was a “disgrace to Islam and the family.” Some even threatened violence. “This is a place,” one boy told him, “Where Islam is the boss.”



Despite reporting incidents to the school administration, Inácio-Steck said he received little support. Administrators urged him to adapt to the students’ “traditional backgrounds” and to avoid “causing trouble.”

Berlin's Moabit neighborhood
(Photo: Zeev Avrahami)

(Photo: Zeev Avrahami)
In one case, he said, he was reprimanded for sitting too closely to students while showing them a Holocaust memorial video on his phone. The administration responded not by investigating the incident but by summoning him to a disciplinary hearing.
In a separate case, the principal filed a police complaint against him for allegedly overstepping his role—after he advised a shivering girl to wear warmer clothes and suggested a sick-looking boy drink water while fasting for Ramadan. He was later ordered to teach in the hallway “for his own safety.”

Eventually diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, Inácio-Steck went on medical leave. “I never thought I’d experience anything like this in Germany,” he said through tears, according to the report. He has since hired a lawyer and collected testimonies from colleagues who described him as a respected and dedicated educator. But his is not an isolated case.

Uziel Inácio-Steck
(Photo: vis Instagram)

Muslim worshippers in Germany
(Photo: AP)

'You can leave. We don’t need you here'​

Teachers from other Berlin districts echoed his experience. Miriam (assumed name), a Balkan-born teacher in Neukölln, said her attempt to teach lessons on democracy were dismissed by administrators who feared backlash from students' families.

 

[bigozt]

Germany has welcomed Arabs long time