Tel Aviv: Nippers are analogous to a sponge which absorbs whatever it is fed. Imagine the future of a world where tender minds are politically corrupted right from adolescence. Sadly, thoughts of some juveniles are carefully cultivated with lies and fallacies. And these beliefs are getting deep and deeper into them generation by generation.
“People don’t really know what their children are reading in textbooks”. One question that bothers many people is how do you explain the cruel behaviour of Israeli soldiers towards Palestinians, an indifference to human suffering, the inflicting of suffering. People ask how can these nice Jewish boys and girls become monsters once they put on a uniform. I think the major reason for that is EDUCATION. So I wanted to see how school books represent Palestinians” – Peled- Elhanan.
Peled-Elhanan is a professor of language and education at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She studied the content of Israeli school books for five years wherein, she says, found found nothing but ‘racism’.
Her book ‘Palestine in Israeli School Books: Ideology and Propaganda in Education’ has been published in the UK which describes how the Nation prepares young Israelis for their compulsory military service.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGNS60VXmxQ
Brief history of Palestinian- Israeli conflict:
Jerusalem was granted special status and was meant to be placed under international sovereignty and control under the 1947 UN Partition Plan to divide historic Palestine between Jewish and Arab states. The special status was based on Jerusalem’s religious importance to the three Abrahamic religions.
Following the UN’s recommendation to divide Palestine, a war arose in 1948 wherein Zionist forces took control of the western half of the city and declared the territory part of its state.
A war in 1967 resulted in Israel capturing the eastern half of Jerusalem, which was under Jordanian control at the time thereby breaching the international law.
In 1980, Israel passed the “Jerusalem Law”, stating that “Jerusalem, complete and united, is the capital of Israel”.
Well, with the ceaseless clobbers of Israel which continues till date there doesn’t seem to be an end to the violence unless the youth from amongst them rise to end the illegal settlements.
Write-up: Sana Sikander
Correspondent – The Siasat Daily.