[On March 19th, Israel Resource News Agency helped to produce a four minute segment on Israel’s TV Commercial Channel Two which documented the most inciteful Palestinian Authority school books used in the public schools of Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem, with the funding of the Israel Ministry of Education. Selected sections of the school books relating to the inculcation of Jihad and the extermination of Israel were featured on the screen of Channel Two.

Following the airing of this segment, Israel Minister of Education Yuli Tamir made an unprecedented declaration, in which she said, in no uncertain terms, that any school where these books are used will lose its public funding. Now, for the first time, an Israeli government minister went on the record on this issue.

All this aired on the night before Israel’s Knesset Education Committee has scheduled a hearing on the subject of Palestinian incitement in their schools.

The process by which this segment was produced: IRNA introduced the correspondent to a professinal who had translated the books and supplied the correspondent with examples of the new Palestinian Authority school books, while IRNA directed the same Channel Two correspondent to the PA school book store in East Jerusalem, which sold her the Jerusalem version of the same school books- without the PA insignia on the cover.

The translator showed the correspondent that the books were identical, except for their cover.

Over the past seven years, ever since IRNA puchased these books from the Palestinian Authority Ministry of Education in Ramallah and from the PA school book store in East Jerusalem, IRNA has been asking the Israel Ministry of Education, the Israel Ministry of Defense, the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Israel Minister for AntiSemitism Affairs as to why the government of Israel does not make a policy issue of the incitement in the PA schools. IRNA has also been asking about the appropriateness of the inclusion of these textbooks in the curriculum of the Jerusalem schools.

In addition, IRNA had asked the same question of the American government.

No answer had been forthcoming- despite the fact that the first step of the “declaration of principles” that was agreed upon in Oslo by Arafat and Abbas involved the eradication of incitement. The most typical answer was the one provided by then-Mayor of Jerusalem Ehud Olmert in 2001: “They can teach what they want and we will teach what we want”. -db ]

US secretary of state says Palestinians must expunge inciteful material from textbooks, publish maps that include Israel; Bush administration to reduce proposed $86 million security assistance package to PA government…

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Wednesday that the US is discussing with the Palestinians the need to end incitement against Israel in schools and print maps that include the State of Israel… Associated Press Published: 03.21.07, 19:59 / Israel News

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