The Palestinian Authority is facing a vicious war from Israel over textbooks in occupied East Jerusalem’s Palestinian schools, according to Deputy Minister of Education Basri Saleh.
He told the official Voice of Palestine radio on Wednesday that Israel is doing its best to change the Palestinian curriculum and to prevent students from learning about their history and culture.
Israel recently introduce new textbooks at East Jerusalem schools after omitting from them pages related to the Palestinian national struggle and history. It also refuses to financially support schools that refuse to use its textbooks instead of the Palestinian Authority’s books that have been taught in schools for many years.
Saleh said in addition to the war over the textbooks, Israel also prevents rehabilitation of schools in the East Jerusalem, mainly in the Old City, to prevent the Palestinian students from getting education in a proper and healthy environment.
He said his ministry is working with parent-teacher associations in the city to confront all these Israeli plans, in addition to resorting to international institutions to put pressure on Israel to stop these violations against the educational process in the city.
Parent-teacher associations in East Jerusalem have also rejected the Israeli-issued textbooks and said they will provide students and schools with the Palestinian textbooks to prevent any distortions in the learning process of their children.
(WAFA)
