JULIE WIENER
Staff Writer
S
eizing
When The Syllabus
Is Hatred
on the
Littleton, Colo.-
spawned concerns
about youth vio-
lence, a small local organi-
zation is launching a stu-
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dent campaign protesting
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what it describes as the
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teaching of hatred in
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Palestinian schools.
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But spokespersons for
peace advocacy organiza-
tions and local Arab organi-
zations wonder if the pro-
ject will accomplish any-
thing of substance. Some
say the effort is merely a
veiled attempt to undermine
the peace process between
Israel and the Palestinians.
The 1-year-old Mothers
Against Teaching Children
to Kill and Hate
(MATCKH) is visiting local
Jewish schools, talking
about anti-Jewish and anti-
Israeli statements in
Palestinian textbooks and
urging students to write
0
0
0
their counterparts in the
Palestinian Authority,
requesting a more peace-ori-
ented curriculum.
The way MATKCH's
impassioned president, Molly
Resnick, sees it, if American
Jews are fearful that violent
Trilateral Anti-Incitement Committee
at the center, which is registered as a
movies and video games can influence
established following November's Wye
non-profit organization in the United
teens like Eric Harris and Dylan
Accords between Israel and the
States and funded by two philan-
Klebold to kill, they should be doubly
Palestinians. The center's Marcus is an
thropists from Israel and Monaco,
fearful about how violent messages in
Israeli representative on the committee.
read 140 textbooks used in Palestinian
state-sanctioned textbooks can influ-
Resnick envisions her student off-
schools, noting references to Israel,
ence Palestinian children to commit
shoot, called Kids for Peace, blossom-
Jews, peace, jihad and violence.
acts of terrorism in Israel or elsewhere.
ing into a national effort, although so
"Our objective in publicizing the
And for Resnick, until the issue is
far it is just getting started locally. The
schoolbooks is to create awareness of
addressed, all peace efforts between
group is not making any efforts to
the problem, which will eventually lead
Israelis and Palestinians are simply
engage Arab Americans.
to new books that not only eliminate
"building on a rotten foundation."
"Our job is first to
the vicious hate against
"The Arabs have to prove that they
wake
up our people to the
Jews and Israel but will
Molly Resnic k talks to
mean it when they say they want
issue and stop Americans
include references to Jews
Akiva stuclen is about
peace," she said. "If you called me
from sending money until
and Israel as legitimate
Palestinian textbooks.
names, but then said to others that
it's resolved," said Resnick.
neighbors," wrote Itamar
you wanted to be my friend, I would
Spokespersons for
Marcus, the center's
say you must be joking."
national peace-related and local Arab
research director, in an e-mail interview.
The objectionable statements in the
organizations said they had not heard
The books are based on old
Palestinian textbooks — which
of Kids for Peace, but they expressed
Jordanian ones; when Israel controlled
include descriptions of Jews as "cun-
skepticism about the project's efficacy.
the Palestinian schools, the offensive
ning" and "treacherous," calls for a
"I don't know how effective it is to
material was expunged from the
holy war against Israel and references
have a Jewish group telling Arabs their
books, but the Palestinian Authority
to the State of Israel as "Palestine" —
books are wrong, or vice versa, without
reintroduced the material in new
were found in a recent study conduct-
a dialogue on both sides," said Meredith
printings, said Marcus.
ed by the Jerusalem-based Center for
Katz. She is associate executive director
Both Palestinian and Israeli text-
Monitoring the Impact of Peace. Aides
of
Seeds of Peace, a summer camp in
books are under discussion in the
N,-,
0,80
6s,,
,
Maine that brings
Jewish and Arab teens
together to discuss the
Middle East conflict.
"I don't think last-
ing change ever
occurs when some-
thing is imposed on
people," Katz added.
Thomas Smerling
is the Washington,
D.C.-based director
of the Israel Policy
Forum, an "indepen-
dent Jewish leader-
ship organization
that supports the
peace process as vital
to Israeli security and
American interests."
He said that while
the "many instances
of hatred" found in
Arab media and text-
books are reprehensi-
ble, he questioned
the rationale of the
"cottage industry?' of
Jewish organizations
dedicated to exposing
these instances.
"Is it a construc-
tive effort to get the
Palestinians to make
the necessary
changes or is it sim-
ply a game of
`gotcha' to show
how terrible they are
and, therefore, pull
the plug on the Oslo accords?"
Terry Ahwal, a Palestinian
American who is the former director
of the local Arab American Anti-
Discrimination Committee and a
board member of the local Seeds of
Peace chapter, said she opposed teach-
ing hatred. But, "It's very naive to
send letters to schools without exam-
ining the issue as a whole and what
the books in Israel teach."
Ahwal, who grew up in the West
Bank city of Ramallah, said Palestinian
children aren't learning hatred from
what is taught in school, but from
interactions with Israeli soldiers, the
difficult living conditions under Israeli
occupation and the frustrations caused
by ongoing border closings and Israeli
restrictions on Palestinian travel.
"Hatred came in because of the
action of the occupier, not because of
what someone is teaching in school,"
she said. "When your teacher is taken
away in front of you and shackled, or
when a child sees his father taken
(-/
A campaign against messages in Palestinian
textbooks draws some questions of its own.
c=(
5/14
1999
6 Detroit Jewish News