Israeli lawmakers are engaged in academic terror against Arabs
The American University in Jenin in the West Bank, in 2018
The lead editorial in Haaretz on 31 December 2024:
C0alition members keep damaging democracy and legislating bills that would harm Arab citizens. Because what is democracy worth if Arabs can participate in it, too?
Last week, contrary to the position of the Knesset legal adviser, the Knesset approved the first vote on a bill that would block graduates of Palestinian institutions from teaching in the Israeli school system.
The bill, initiated by Likud MK Amit Halevi and similar to a proposal by MK Avichai Boaron, states that the Education Ministry director general can block someone with a degree from a Palestinian academic institution from receiving a teaching certificate or a job.
The bill also proposes that the education minister can grant approval to someone seeking a job within Israel’s education system, or who is already working in Israel’s education system, so long as the candidate completes studies in Israel.
The coalition members’ justifications are horribly well known, racist and populist. “The education at these institutions includes antisemitic content and indoctrination focused on denying Israel’s existence and extreme incitement against Israel,” states the explanatory text accompanying the bill. During a discussion, Boaron wasn’t ashamed to describe the bill as an attempt to de-Nazify East Jerusalem.
“I dove into the numbers and I was amazed: Of the 6,720 so-called teachers in East Jerusalem who are teaching 110,000 students, nearly 4,000 attended universities in the Palestinian Authority … where they soaked up the Islamic Jihad’s poison of Israel-hatred, and came here to inculcate it in East Jerusalem’s students.”
The level of debate was low, as suits the most racist parliament in Israel’s history. “These teachers could be teachers in Tehran, Afghanistan, Ramallah – but not in our schools. Thank you,” Halevi said. Arab Knesset members who took part in the debate on teachers were called on to denounce Hamas.
MK Mansour Abbas was correct in saying that the debate was political and not professional or educational. And yet, this is not a campaign against teachers who violated the law and are inciting in the classrooms, but a wholescale block against anyone who attended a university in the Palestinian Authority.
In this regard, the bill joins a long list of bills and laws intended to collectively harm the political representation of Arab citizens and to limit their free speech.
MK Youssef Atauna pointed out that in addition, this bill is unnecessary because “anyone who receives a degree from a Palestinian Authority institution is required to get a teaching certificate from an Israeli institution.”
This is an unconstitutional, racist proposal that harms the freedom of occupation and discriminates against Israel’s Arab citizens who attended Palestinian institutions of higher education.
The attorney general needs to make sure the racist MKs know this, and the university heads and teachers’ organizations must voice their objection to the bill.
This article is reproduced in its entirety