Palestinian Textbooks Teach Hatred of Jews and Israel
and Erase the Presence of Palestinian Christians
Palestinian children are being primed for "a continuous and long-range confrontation against the State of Israel," a recent report found.
The study, by Dr. Arnon Gross of the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, in conjunction with David Bedein of the Center for Near East Policy Research, looked at nearly 400 school textbooks published between 2013 and 2020, and more than one hundred teachers’ guides, mostly published in 2018, for a greater insight into how the material was being taught.
They found three main strands of indoctrination running though the texts:
a) delegitimization of the State of Israel’s existence, including the denial of Jewish holy sites within Israel;
b) demonization of Israel and the Jews, who are regularly referred to as “the Zionist enemy”; and
c) incitement to violent struggle to reclaim the whole of Israel as Palestine, with no education for peace and co-existence.
The report notes, adding: “There is no trace in the schoolbooks of the arguments spread by the Palestinian Authority in the international arena that the Palestinian Authority is committed to ‘a just peace’ based on the two-state solution.”
Messages such as these were not confined to classes on reading comprehension and nationalism, but found throughout the curricula, the report found, including in core subjects such as mathematics.
One math problem for Grade 11 students read: “One of the settlers [Israelis] shoots at [Palestinian] cars that pass on one of the roads. If the probability of his hitting a car in one shot is 0..7, and the settler shot at 10 cars, what will you expect to be the number of cars that were hit?” The answer given in the teacher’s notes was seven.
Use of the textbooks is mandatory in all Palestinian schools, both private and those run by the UN Relief and Works Agency. In addition, UNRWA allocates 54% of their budget to education in the Palestinian territories, which includes Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip.
There has to be a demand for change from donor countries if there is to be any hope for peace.
The study, by Dr. Arnon Gross of the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, in conjunction with David Bedein of the Center for Near East Policy Research, looked at nearly 400 school textbooks published between 2013 and 2020, and more than one hundred teachers’ guides, mostly published in 2018, for a greater insight into how the material was being taught.
They found three main strands of indoctrination running though the texts:
a) delegitimization of the State of Israel’s existence, including the denial of Jewish holy sites within Israel;
b) demonization of Israel and the Jews, who are regularly referred to as “the Zionist enemy”; and
c) incitement to violent struggle to reclaim the whole of Israel as Palestine, with no education for peace and co-existence.
The report notes, adding: “There is no trace in the schoolbooks of the arguments spread by the Palestinian Authority in the international arena that the Palestinian Authority is committed to ‘a just peace’ based on the two-state solution.”
Messages such as these were not confined to classes on reading comprehension and nationalism, but found throughout the curricula, the report found, including in core subjects such as mathematics.
One math problem for Grade 11 students read: “One of the settlers [Israelis] shoots at [Palestinian] cars that pass on one of the roads. If the probability of his hitting a car in one shot is 0..7, and the settler shot at 10 cars, what will you expect to be the number of cars that were hit?” The answer given in the teacher’s notes was seven.
Use of the textbooks is mandatory in all Palestinian schools, both private and those run by the UN Relief and Works Agency. In addition, UNRWA allocates 54% of their budget to education in the Palestinian territories, which includes Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip.
There has to be a demand for change from donor countries if there is to be any hope for peace.
