European Parliament condemns UNWRA for teaching hate and inciting to violence in schools
Plenary session in Brussels - week 25
A resolution adopted Wednesday insists that EU aid must be made conditional on educational material’s compliance with UN values and the removal of hateful content
UNRWA worked intensively to block the resolution; Palestinian Prime Minister addressed parliament’s foreign relations committee to defend textbooks
The European Parliament adopted Wednesday an unprecedented resolution condemning UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, for teaching hate and incitement to violence in its schools.
The resolution demands that hateful material be “removed immediately” and insists that EU funding “must be made conditional” on educational material promoting peace and tolerance.
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The European Parliament has passed a resolution expressing concern about “hate speech and violence” taught in textbooks and schools run by the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees, or UNRWA.
The resolution urges the agency to remove the offending content, stressing EU aid should be made conditional on educational materials “complying with UNESCO standards of peace, tolerance, coexistence and non-violence.”
Israeli watchdog IMPACT-se, which analyzes Palestinian textbooks, hailed the “unprecedented” resolution.
“This is a really important step in the fight to prevent UNRWA from inciting many thousands of children every school day to violence, extremism and antisemitism. It is the very first time a legislature has stepped up said to UNRWA, ‘enough,’” IMPACT-se chief Marcus Sheff says in a statement.
Yemen’s teachers’ union accuses Houthis of indoctrinating children
Yahya Al-Yinai, a spokesman for the Yemeni Teachers Syndicate, told the Daily Telegraph that the militias had overhauled the teaching curriculum and installed their supporters as principals in just about 90 percent of the schools under their control.
Tuesday 20/04/2021
Students attend morning drills in Sana’a, Yemen. (REUTERS)
LONDON – Yemen’s teachers’ union denounced what it described as Tehran’s use of education to pursue a “policy of cultural colonialism,” in statements published by the Daily Telegraph.
According to the teachers’ union, Yemeni children are being indoctrinated with violent and anti-Semitic propaganda in areas controlled by the Iran-aligned Houthis.
Marcus Sheff, the chief executive of Impact-se, told the
Telegraph that the Houthis appeared to have no red lines in their education drive.
“The closest we have seen to being this extreme is ISIS materials,” he said.
Houthi textbooks included graphic images of dead children and glorified violence as “the only solution for resolving conflicts”, the Impact-se report said.
The United States was described as the “Greater Satan” and as the enemy of all Arabs and Muslims, it said.
The American flag was used in images as a symbol of “oppression, colonialism or simply the enemy”, researchers found.
Children were taught a Houthi slogan including the words “Death to America, Death to Israel” as part of an exercise on learning Arabic, the report said.
The closest we have seen to being this is extreme is ISIS materials, said one analyst
15 April 2021 • 6:30am
Primary school students celebrate the end of their academic year at their school in March in Houthi-controlled capital city Sanaa
Credit: Mohammed Hamoud /Getty Images Europe
Three million Yemeni children living in areas under Houthi control are being indoctrinated with education material filled with violent, anti-Semitic propaganda, an official from the Yemeni Teachers Syndicate has told the Telegraph.
Yahya Al-Yinai, the union’s head of media, said he had documented hundreds of changes to the teaching curriculum by the Iran-backed group, which since 2014 has fought a war against the government of Yemen.