This week I receive several articles from the Dutch press in which Palestinian society and education are accused of incitement and anti-semitism. I am amazed about the unrestrained generalizations. In one case it is said that Palestinian education is “bombarded” by anti-Semitic books from “the book stores and book stands of Cairo and Damascus.” In fact, Palestinian schools and universities would certainly like to be bombarded by (good) books but either there is no money or the mail does not work. Mary, who is in charge of the acquisition of books at Bethlehem University, had problems for many months with ordered books held back in containers at the Mediterranean Sea or the Allenby Bridge at the border with Jordan. They were left there for reasons of “security” or because the university had to pay exorbitantly high taxes on imported books which have to come through Israel even though they are not used there. 

The last few years an Israeli committee, associated with the previous Netanyahu government, diligently examined textbooks employed at Palestinian schools. The results are summed up in page-long advertisements in the Israeli and American press in which Palestinian educators are accused of anti-semitism. I wonder about the reliability of the quotes brought forward as evidence. In one case, Khalil Mahshi, director of the international  department of the Palestinian Ministry of Education, examined such an accusation of “negating the existence of Israel” and it turned out that the quote was not from a textbook but a reference book mentioned in the textbook. That reference book dated from before the existence of Israel. It is definitely possible to find some harsh anti-Israel and indeed anti-Jewish quotes in the textbooks used at Palestinian schools but these textbooks are not Palestinian ones, but from Jordan (used at schools in the West Bank) or Egypt (at schools in Gaza). 

Palestinians are in fact not at all happy with these textbooks since they barely refer to the reality they experience. Students learn more about Amman and Cairo than about Ramallah, Jerusalem and Bethlehem. In the history books of the Jordanian curriculum you may not even find any mentioning of the origin of the Palestinian refugee problem. The reason is that the issue of Palestinian refugees is an extremely sensitive subject in Jordan, where the majority of the population are Palestinian refugees. At the moment the Palestinian Ministry of Education is busy replacing the Jordanian and Egyptian curricula by their own curriculum. In this academic year the first and six graders are now working with the new Palestinian curriculum. Yet their Palestinian teachers are still not terribly happy about it, in part because there is still not a lot of material about the students’ own environment. For instance, English teachers complain that the characters in the English stories almost exclusively bear Anglo-Saxan names, even in Arab settings. 

However, with respect to the images of Israel and Jews, there are clear changes. This is in fact also acknowledged in Israel. A research team from the Truman Institute of the Hebrew University, led by Ruth Firer, came to the following conclusion: “We were surprised to find how moderate the anger directed towards Israelis in the Palestinian textbooks is, compared to the Palestinian predicament and suffering,” Firer says. “This surprise is doubled when you compare the Palestinian books to Israeli ones from the 1950s and 1960s, which mentioned gentiles [only] in the context of pogroms and the Holocaust.” (quoted in Haaretz, 2/1/2001). The books are “freer of negative stereotypes of Jews and Israelis, compared to Jordanian and Egyptian books.”  When I discuss the Dutch articles with some school principals during a meeting this week, they say that they do not know of any anti-semitic passages in lesson materials in the government and United Nations schools they run. The only reservation they have is that they don’t always know what teachers tell to their students. 

I myself have doubts how influential Palestinian education is in imposing images of Israel or Jews on pupils. The students have their own ideas about Israel. These ideas are not so much related to education but rather to the political situation, the news, and what they see and hear around them. In Hebron, Ishmail says, students were nervous and angry the day after they saw the TV images of the killed Hebronite man who was dragged by soldiers. The curfew in Hebron has been lifted (we don’t know for how long), and Ishmail and his teachers and students are now able to go back – although with a detour - to their school located in the center of the city. When the students look up from the school, they see the barrel of a tank placed on a high point overlooking the inner city. (To see Israelis in Palestine, you have often to look upwards. The settlements are located on hill tops and the regular checkpoints usually have watchtowers). The tank is located in the courtyard of a girls’ school which the Israeli army transformed into an army storage and observation point. Some of the windows were broken wide open to make room for the equipment. Another school is closed for similar purposes. The students without schools now follow lessons at other (overcrowded) schools. Teachers in downtown Hebron follow a UNICEF-sponsored program in which they discuss how to apply self-learning materials when students cannot come to school due to a curfew. 

Another anti-Palestinian article in the Dutch press expresses a great deal of fear and anxiety. It leaps from a criticism of the execution of Palestinian collaborators, in itself quite justified, to the contention that life is not held sacred in “Islam,” and from there to the conclusion that Israel is now in mortal danger! I remember my own research, more than ten year ago, into how popular literature in the West depicted a frightening Arab world and Islam. One of the findings was a certain basic scheme to which you could trace back many thriller plots. At the beginning of the narrative chain stands a conpirator, usually an Arab leader. The threatening plot subsequently features Palestinian desperados (often psychologically wounded by a personal or family trauma), indoctrination by “Islam,” as well as the presence of a dangerous, hidden weapon, and vulnerability and naivete on the side of the West. During the current Intifada, I think that similar “little” narratives influence what is believed in the West - although to a lesser extent than in the past. One example is the narrative of a Barak giving Arafat a very generous offer, after which Arafat viciously betrays him and incites the Palestinian masses to get more than what Israel security-wise can allow for. Or there is the narrative of an Arafat, who together with Palestinian educators and Palestinian parents, cynically uses young children for indoctrination purposes or as cannon fodder. 

As far as the last point is concerned, I think that the opposite is more true: Palestinian parents and educators are largely powerless in dealing with the anger of their students and children. A journalist of Dutch radio, who will come in a few weeks’ time to cover the Israeli elections, asks me if he could visit a Palestinian classroom to get informed about how the Palestinian children look at Israelis. He will also visit an Israeli class. I wonder about the results of this comparison. Suzy once told me that in an exchange project with an Israeli school two years ago, the Israeli students were shocked to see Palestinian girls who did not wear the veil. There even was an Israeli student who thought that Palestinians had tails. Conversely, Palestinians, although they are certainly not without stereotypes, often have considerable experience with Israeli society, may speak a little Hebrew, and have heard stories from family members who worked in Israel. 

Obviously, it would be very helpful if there are more encounters between Palestinian and Israeli children, to take away mutual fears, stereotyping and ignorance. At present this is not possible. After the hundreds of deaths and many thousands of wounded and handicapped youngsters, it is inconceivable to have normal encounters, let alone educationally fruitful ones. Ishmail tells that his daughter, who is in the United States on a Seeds for Peace programme, shows a film at university campuses which she made together with an Israeli student. Here to do so would be impossible. Suha, just back from her engagement party in Amman (she tells that her Jewish host family in Holland came over to Amman to congratulate her), is now unemployed because her employer, the Israeli-Palestinian Center for Research and Information (IPCRI), had to suspend all its Israeli-Palestinian educational exchanges. Also Fuad, a strong advocate of peace projects, has suspended such activities, to considerable cost of the school. 

A year ago we had a heated discussion about Israeli-Palestinian exchange projects at our institute. Fuad strongly advocated the projects, citing the need for intercultural education and reconciliation, while others opposed them on political grounds as the projects were seen to create a situation of “normalization” while the occupation continues. The majority had educational and practical reservations. At the Freres School, for instance, it happened that many parents opposed the exchanges because they are usually one-sided: the Palestinian students go to Israel, but the Israeli students do not go to the Palestinian partner and thus do not learn about Palestinian reality. (The Israeli Ministry of Education does not allow traveling by Israeli students to Palestinian-controlled areas. In one case, students and teachers of one school in West-Jerusalem, twinned with the Freres School, did not mind the prohibition and came over “illegally”). Another objection made is that Palestinian students are sometimes invited to visit a beautiful resort in Israel, such as the beach or a kibbutz; there they have the weekend of their life, but on their return to their own difficult situation, they once again see Israelis in other roles than as friends and colleagues, and over time become only more frustrated - the “cold shower” or “morning after” argument. Last week Bethlehem mayor Hannah Nasir told that he did not believe in triangular relations in which a foreign city together with an Israeli city twin with Bethlehem. He had three experiences and none of them materialized after the agreement. The problem, he said, is that as long as the base of the relationship between Palestinians and Israelis is not stable in terms of a just peace, everything what you build upon it does not hold. This opinion may be fairly representative among Palestinians here.

I myself think that the best way of bringing Palestinians and Israelis together is to let them sleep at each other’s homes. That is the best way to see each other’s reality and build trust over fear. The Center for Rapprochement in Beit Sahour used to invite Israelis and let them sleep over there. Reportedly, they felt happy and safe – safer, they said, than in Israel. I must think about a little dilemma we lately discussed in an educator’s workshop in Bethlehem: “Who is more powerful, the king who is able to impose upon his subjects to commit suicide by jumping from a high point, ot the king who feels safe to stay the night in any of his subjects’ home?” (The story of the king staying the night with his subjects resonates with the Arab heritage which contains many stories about kings occasionally mingling among subjects). 

At present it is very difficult for Israelis to stay, let alone to stay the night, in the West Bank and Gaza. Last week, two Israelis were killed in Tulkarem by a group of Fatah members. They wanted to revenge a family member of one of them, Thabet Thabet, who was a Fatah leader assassinated during one of the Israeli operations targeting the leaders of the Intifadah. Thabet was in fact himself involved in Seeds for Peace projects with Israelis and a welcome guest at Israeli homes. Now his wife appeals to the Israeli High Court to challenge the legality of the assassination. She condemned the revenge killing by the relative who according to her was never involved in any anti-Israeli activity but traumatized by the killing of his uncle. 

This week more Israelis on a visit to a West Bank town were threatened, one of them killed. In my environment most people are not sympathetic to those killings, especially when they involve Israelis from within the Green Line (that is, not settlers). At the same time many Palestinians embrace the argument that Israel only moves forwards when its citizens suffer. One problem with this argument, except its morality, is that the violence hits back hard on Palestinian society in the form of excessive Israeli retaliations and closures, the emergence of a class of militants having their own unlawful “laws,” and the exclusion from public life of those people who do not want or cannot participate in an armed struggle, such as women. 

One Israeli is still roaming around the West Bank in taxis, and perhaps even still living in Ramallah. She is Amira Hass, journalist of Haaretz. I know her from many years ago, when we both were members of the Pax Christi Middle East group in Holland, for a short time. Her mother, originally from the Balkans, died in a concentration camp. Inspired by her courageous attitude and writings, Amira Hass vowed to never give up moral solidarity with victims and to unmask the dominant powers of force. For many years now she lives in Gaza and the West Bank. These days she writes about the extreme closure which is still everywhere in place. (The exception is the Bethlehem area, where there is now something like a “normal” closure, with checkpoint soldiers more relaxed than during the past two-three months). Mary marvels about Amira’s courage to go into Palestinian taxis in every conceivable region of the West Bank and Gaza. In one report, of yesterday, she writes how a Palestinian woman gave birth in a taxi on the way to hospital, after many checkpoint delays. The woman and her family were forced at gunpoint by soldiers to come out of the car for investigation. The new-born baby was still linked by her umbiblical cord to the mother, who fainted after leaving the taxi. The baby was called “Sabreen,” related to the word “patience.”

The political process is still split in optimistic and pessimistic days, as a much used Arab proverb says: “Yoom basal, yoom ‘asal” (One day onion, the other day honey). The negotiations in Taba have been conducted in a rather good atmosphere, except for an Israeli “time out” to commemorate two Israelis killed in a shooting.  (One remark from a Palestinian in Gaza: “Why don’t the Palestinians take a time out when Palestinians are killed?”) I see in the paper a large photo of the Palestinian and Israeli negotiators who, side by side, at equal level, wave at Peace Now demonstrators in Eilat. My images and thoughts are split. I see the grim smile of Shlomo Ben Ami, the Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs, a former professor of Spanish literature knowledgeable about Andalusia and Moslem-Jewish living together, but also the previous Minister of Police ultimately responsible for the death of 12 Palestinians in Israel in October last year. Another familiar intellectual face is Yossi Beilin, the Israeli Justice Minister who hopes to leave behind the “nightmare” of the Intifada and wants to go back to the peace talks of Oslo as if nothing had happened. And there is of course the face of Sharon appearing from behind the back of Barak. In off-hand remarks to a supporter, Sharon lately said that in case of shootings from Beit Jala to Gilo, he would order the destruction of rows of houses in Beit Jala, one row after the other. It seems we’ll all need more patience.

Shireen tells that she heard the following story. A tanzim in Beit Jala shot at Gilo and suddenly saw the appearance of a man in the dark who warned him that he had to leave quickly because the Israelis would kill him if he did not. The man left the place; and briefly afterwards exactly that place was shelled. People told him that the appearance was St Nicholas, the patron saint of Beit Jala. There are in fact, hundreds of stories in this region about the protective or healing deeds of St Nicholas and St George - another people’s saint. People used to see them appearing in their hours of emergency or need. The gunman in question, a Moslem, went to the St Nicholas church to thank the saint. Nishreen heard that the man later on asked to be baptized, as a gesture of gratitude. In fact, in the past it happened quite often that Moslem parents invoked the intercession of Christian saints to overcome problems of life, such as infertility. When the baby would come, it was baptized with water, but not with the oil – the Sacrament of Confirmation -  so that the child would not loose the Islamic faith. Or the baby was given a Christian name. When I tell her the story, Mary says that this week she overheard two Islamic women talking with each other at the Bethlehem market. One was a grandmother of a girl named “Nathalie” – a Christian name not so familiar to Islamic ears. The woman said that each time she forgot the name, she called her granddaughter mistakingly “Netanyahu”! Suzy once told me that she is sometimes mocked by those who know that her last name “Atallah,” “gift of God,” is the Arabic equivalent of the Hebrew “Netanyahu.”

Our telephone is dead for a few days because the wires outside are damaged due to rainy weather. The other day, I visit the institute and stay behind alone. The electricity is once again cut and everything is completely dark; the radio music stops. I am barely able to grope my way out. At home Mary tells that Jara made a gun of lego. A gun? I’ll inquire with her school supervisors but they don’t know of anything. It seems Jara just makes what reality shows her. Good weather arrives. During the evening I walk with Jara to see the multitude of stars up in the silent night – there are no shootings anymore - and to see the faraway lights of the houses on top of the Jordan hills, some 40 km away. I’ll tell everybody not to forget to look at the beautiful stars. “Yes, yes, we do” say Karishma and Shireen. Jara does not want to sleep in her own bed, nor to stay in ours’. Instead, she wants to sleep in the laundry basket. But that’s too cold, we say. She stays stubborn, doesn’t negotiate and we feel forced to give her a calming “time out” into another room (I join her so as not to let her feel alone). She becomes quiet only in her sleep. Next day, Mary tells, in a kind of afterthought during the breakfast exchange, that she had a dream in which she was shot in the head. “It wasn’t serious, afterwards I was brought to hospital and treated well,” she said. “Don’t stare at me like that, it was just a dream.”