Mabat Report on Palestinian Textbooks
Chaim Yavin: “The Palestinians themselves are breeding a new generation of hatred towards Israel.”
Palestinian woman: “This is the Middle East, but Israel isn’t here. There is no Israel.”
Chaim Yavin: “Even for the optimists among us, with everything concerning the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it is hard to settle between the peace declarations from Ramallah with the anti-Jewish incitement and hatred which continues within the Palestinian educational system. Eli Nissan and Ohad Chemo report.”
Ohad Chemo (reporter): “Does Israel appear in your maps?”
First Palestinian woman: “Yes, of course.”
Second Palestinian woman: “Israel? Palestine appears.”
First Palestinian woman: “No, Palestine appears.”
Ohad Chemo: “Do not let this mistake confuse you. In most Palestinian textbooks, Israel simply does not appear.”
Palestinian woman: “This is the map of the Middle East.”
Ohad Chemo: “But Israel doesn’t appear here.”
Palestinian woman: “Israel isn’t here. Good, this is what I’m telling you.”
Ohad Chemo: “How do you want to be our neighbors if Israel isn’t here?”
Palestinian woman: “You want us to be your neighbors? But this land is our land.”
Ohad Chemo: “The Bethlehem school for girls spoke to us today in nationalistic terms. A territorial struggle between two peoples, on the area between Jordan and the sea, and on a damaged historical justification. But today there is someone who believes that the Palestinian education is changing.
MK Michael Melchior (Chairman of education committee): “Education of incitement, of hatred, shifting the conflict from a national territorial conflict that can be solved, into a religious and existential conflict that cannot be solved.”
Ohad Chemo: “In this report, Palestinian Media Watch presented to the Knesset education committee today, a report on eight new textbooks from the Palestinian educational system. The image of the world [in those books] is difficult. Israel is referred to as “the Zionist enemy,” the conflict is religious, the peace process does not exist.”
Itamar Marcus: “The Palestinian youth is not given the possibility to accept Israel, because it is receiving this image of an ugly state, that it cannot accept, not from a national stance, and not from religious stance.”
Ohad Chemo: “For example, it is stated in a 12-grade textbook, that ‘Palestine’s war ended with a catastrophe that is unprecedented in history.’ Afterwards it states that ‘the Zionist gangs stole Palestine…and expelled its people in order to establish the State of Israel.’
Can the curriculum being taught in Palestinian schools be described as incitement? It depends on who you ask. What is considered many times in Israel as hate education, is considered here in the [Palestinian] territories as absolutely legitimate.”
First Palestinian woman: “There is an Israeli song, I don’t know Hebrew in a sufficient level, but it talks about the borders of Israel from the Nile until the Euphrates River. Do you deny that?”
Second Palestinian woman: “As human beings, as Palestinians, our support is given to our people, to our land, to our Jerusalem, to our roots. Of course, we don’t recognize Israel.”
Palestinian woman: “This is the Middle East, but Israel isn’t here. There is no Israel.”
Chaim Yavin: “Even for the optimists among us, with everything concerning the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it is hard to settle between the peace declarations from Ramallah with the anti-Jewish incitement and hatred which continues within the Palestinian educational system. Eli Nissan and Ohad Chemo report.”
Ohad Chemo (reporter): “Does Israel appear in your maps?”
First Palestinian woman: “Yes, of course.”
Second Palestinian woman: “Israel? Palestine appears.”
First Palestinian woman: “No, Palestine appears.”
Ohad Chemo: “Do not let this mistake confuse you. In most Palestinian textbooks, Israel simply does not appear.”
Palestinian woman: “This is the map of the Middle East.”
Ohad Chemo: “But Israel doesn’t appear here.”
Palestinian woman: “Israel isn’t here. Good, this is what I’m telling you.”
Ohad Chemo: “How do you want to be our neighbors if Israel isn’t here?”
Palestinian woman: “You want us to be your neighbors? But this land is our land.”
Ohad Chemo: “The Bethlehem school for girls spoke to us today in nationalistic terms. A territorial struggle between two peoples, on the area between Jordan and the sea, and on a damaged historical justification. But today there is someone who believes that the Palestinian education is changing.
MK Michael Melchior (Chairman of education committee): “Education of incitement, of hatred, shifting the conflict from a national territorial conflict that can be solved, into a religious and existential conflict that cannot be solved.”
Ohad Chemo: “In this report, Palestinian Media Watch presented to the Knesset education committee today, a report on eight new textbooks from the Palestinian educational system. The image of the world [in those books] is difficult. Israel is referred to as “the Zionist enemy,” the conflict is religious, the peace process does not exist.”
Itamar Marcus: “The Palestinian youth is not given the possibility to accept Israel, because it is receiving this image of an ugly state, that it cannot accept, not from a national stance, and not from religious stance.”
Ohad Chemo: “For example, it is stated in a 12-grade textbook, that ‘Palestine’s war ended with a catastrophe that is unprecedented in history.’ Afterwards it states that ‘the Zionist gangs stole Palestine…and expelled its people in order to establish the State of Israel.’
Can the curriculum being taught in Palestinian schools be described as incitement? It depends on who you ask. What is considered many times in Israel as hate education, is considered here in the [Palestinian] territories as absolutely legitimate.”
First Palestinian woman: “There is an Israeli song, I don’t know Hebrew in a sufficient level, but it talks about the borders of Israel from the Nile until the Euphrates River. Do you deny that?”
Second Palestinian woman: “As human beings, as Palestinians, our support is given to our people, to our land, to our Jerusalem, to our roots. Of course, we don’t recognize Israel.”