Shared from the 7/25/2019 Houston Chronicle eEdition

State curriculum shouldn’t put blame on Palestinians

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Tsafrir Abayov / Associated Press

An Israeli police officer checks the ID of a Palestinian man at a checkpoint outside Jerusalem in 2017.

The Texas state curriculum for high school social studies leaves students with the impression that conflict in the Middle East boils down to this: The Palestinians are the bad guys, and the Israelis are the good guys.

The Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills for Social Studies used to require public school teachers to “explain how Arab rejection of the State of Israel has led to ongoing conflict.”

In November, the Texas State Board of Education softened that a bit, changing the requirement to “discuss factors contributing to the Arab-Israeli conflict, including the rejection of the existence of the State of Israel by the Arab League and a majority of Arab nations.”

But note that word “rejection” remains. This puts the blame for the conflict on Arabs’ rejection. As a Palestinian Muslim American born on the West Bank, I know firsthand that’s not the whole picture.

In 1999, my parents were recipients of the Diversity Immigrant Visa program, commonly known as the “visa lottery,” granting our family United States citizenship. Ihave lived in the Dallas area most of my life.

When my family travels back to the West Bank, we are always under suspicion.

I am restricted from traveling into Israel through the Tel Aviv airport. As a Palestinian, I am forced to go through the checkpoints put forth by Israel. These checkpoints require extensive and unnecessary searches that can take hours to get through.

“The Basic Law: Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People,” passed in July 2018, described the Israeli state as being only for the Jewish people. This law dismisses Palestinians’ existence and right to legal recognition as citizens of the country.

Israel’s separation barrier, or wall, restricts Palestinians from leaving the West Bank/Gaza. Many Palestinians call it the “apartheid wall.” Additionally, there are more than 700 barriers restricting movement of Palestinians within the West Bank itself.

This isn’t about Palestinians “rejecting” the State of Israel as much as it is about Israelis rejecting the basic human rights of Palestinians.

Reducing the longstanding Israeli-Palestinian conflict to an issue of “Arab rejection,” as the Texas State Board of Education continues to do, dismisses Israel’s violations of human rights. These include civilian killings, building illegal settlements and restricting the human rights to water, health and sanitation.

A better curriculum — like any attempt at Palestinian-Israeli peace — must address the human rights and dignity of all individuals within the conflict.

Nation states do not have the right to exist. People have the right to exist.

Ghanim is a senior in the Southern Methodist University Human Rights Program, where she is researching the role of education in shaping perceptions of the longstanding Israeli-Palestinian conflict. She enters law school in August 2020 and plans to concentrate on international law.

See this article in the e-Edition Here
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