The veteran Jewish teacher who was forced to lock herself in an office while a rowdy mob of students hunted her down at a “radicalized’ Queens high school was back on the job for the first time Thursday — behind a blue wall.
NYPD cops blanketed Hillcrest High School in Jamaica as school opened, forcing all vehicles away from the streets near the campus and providing security for the targeted teacher, who has not been identified.
“I wanted to say hi but the cop stopped me,” one 17-year-old senior told The Post. “I usually say hi to her. I had her my freshman year for health. I just wanted to welcome her back.
“No, the cops stopped me,” the teen said. “They said, ‘Sorry, go to your class.'”
The veteran teacher had been out of the classroom since Nov. 20, when hundreds of anti-Israel Hillcrest students stormed through the hallways looking for the educator after she attended a pro-Israeli rally and posted about the experience on Facebook.
Fearful for her safety, administrators had her lock herself inside an office during the riot.
On Thursday, cops made sure she was kept at arm’s length from any potential harm.
“I wouldn’t say lockdown,” one senior said. “I mean, there’s effort being made. Witness protection don’t get as many men on them as she did today. The cops aren’t going to leave until she leaves.
“They’re a lot more cops out here than inside,” he added. “The cops inside are all like a perimeter around [the teacher], around her room, and following her all day.”
The teacher met with school staff and administrators near her classroom, and also chatted with United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew after arriving at Hillcrest, sources said.
However, she declined to speak with reporters who waited outside the school.
In a statement for an exclusive report by The Post on the riot last weekend, the 23-year veteran teacher said she “was shaken to my core by the calls to violence against me.”
On Monday, city Schools Chancellor David Banks spent the day at the school in an attempt to diffuse the potentially explosive tensions there and was told by several teachers they feared for their safety.
But Banks appeared to downplay the troubling antisemitic incidents, telling reporters that the suggestion that the students were radicalized was “the height of irresponsibility.”
A group of Big Apple Jewish teachers and parents blasted the school chief at a press conference on Tuesday, saying he failed to properly address the situation at Hillcrest.
And on Thursday, the United Jewish Appeal of New York, a prominent advocacy group called on the chancellor to meet with Jewish teachers to develop a plan to combat rampant antisemitism in city schools.
“UJA Federation appreciates the partnership with New York City public schools and looks forward to continued dialogue with Chancellor Banks to ensure our schools have the policies in place to support safe and supportive learning environments … free from antisemitism and all forms of hate,” the group’s president, Daniel Rosenthal, told The Post.
Banks spokesman Nathaniel Styer said the school chief looked forward “to the continued work with our invaluable community partners and all education stakeholders” to ensure schools remain safe.
Meanwhile, sources revealed that four students were suspended following the antisemitic riot at Hillcrest on Nov. 20. No arrests were reported, and a harassment bust referenced by Banks and school officials on Monday referred to an 18-year-old student who allegedly made unrelated threatening remarks online.
The riot came a week after four Hillcrest students — two 15-year-old boys and two 16-year-old boys — were arrested for allegedly assaulting an NYPD school safety agent who was trying to break up a fight.