The Palestinians have Nahoul, Farfour and Assud to spread hatred of Jews.

God, is this propaganda tiresome. So you think that Israelis are w/o sin in this regard? That they hold Palestinians and their fellow Israeli Arab citizens in such high regard? Gimme a break.

even people who are posting their supposedly informed opinions here haven’t even seen one!).

More tiresomeness. First, are you claiming that you have done original research into this matter? That you’ve studied actual Palestinian textbooks? And in fact, Gregory Starrett has done precisely what you claim no one commenting here has done. Try to hold yr ignorance in abeyance.

Just type Hamas into the search engine at Youtube and you’ll see what I mean.

Just look at what groups are uploading this material to the web. You’ll find that they are the usual anti-Palestinian suspects like MEMRI, etc. which have a vested interest in self-selecting the most damaging material they can find to bolster a pre-conceived image of Palestinians. It wouldn’t be very hard for an anti-Zionist group to do the same if they spent as much time as MEMRI does ferreting out damaging material in the Israeli media (& it’s there believe me).

In contrast to school textbooks, Palestinian and Israeli TV is widely available for public viewing on the internet and there is no doubt; the Palestinians are rearing their children with hate images and the glorification of terrorism. Just type Hamas into the search engine at Youtube and you’ll see what I mean.

One of the things to keep in mind is that whatever their content, textbooks are only a very minor part of the intellectual environment of students. The development of political or ethnic prejudices are much more closely tied to what is said in the home and in friendship circles, to an individual’s personal experience, and to broader media exposure (including the internet, now). This is the case not only in the Middle East, but in the US as well. For a powerful argument that history textbooks, for example, are largely uninspiring mental sludge, incapable on their own of causing students to hold strong opinions or be able to think properly about much of anything, see James Loewen’s excellent book on American history textbooks, Lies My Teacher Told Me (New Press, 2008).

At the risk of triggering yet more heat on this issue, I’ll just repeat my earlier point: blaming the content of school textbooks for the world’s problems is silly, and using them as a means of advancing political careers rather than attending to real-world problems is irresponsible, no matter who does it.

in Israel it is the newscaster who presents the news. Since the textbooks were right there it would follow that the newscaster knew what he was talkng about, as well as Senator Hillary Clinton.

@ Amir: There are ways to present a news rpt. that allow the viewer to actually see the material in question. That’s what computer graphics are all about. Pages can be blown up & shown along w. other graphic aids. None of this was used so a viewer would have no idea what was in the texts. Newscasters are especially lazy journalist & almost never do their own research. They usually accept what they are told by the source, in this case an anti-Palestinian Israeli media source. Clinton has her own staff but has no interest in testing the authenticity of the research presented to her.

That’s the entire purpose of what Diane & I are doing. We’re trying to put pressure on anyone who uses this suspect research to examine it in greater depth & to read other contradicting sources before making a rush to judgment.

Israeli textbooks do not promote zenophobia and racism

This is a lie as you have been presented with actual quotations fr. Israeli texts which are racist & xenophobic. This is yet another example of yr intectually bad faith.

I have had several children go through the National Religious school system, and like
Amir, they don’t recall seeing anything like “the Arabs are primitive, the Arabs are barbarians”, and the other epithets Gregory claims are taught.

@Bar Kochba: Well, who should we believe–a Likud & settler supporter presenting anecdotal evidence using his children as a source saying that there is no racism in Israeli textbooks or a professor of anthropology at the Univ. of North Carolina whose career is based on the authenticity of his findings and research sources? Have you read the article Starret links to? If not, you should do so before telling us there is no racism in Israeli textbooks.

Compare this with Americans teaching their kids about their wars with Germany in the 20th century, and the need for the US to enter these wars. German atrocities would be mentioned.

Several fallacies here. First, I’d venture to say that except for Pearl Harbor no “atrocities” against U.S. troops or citizens would be mentioned in U.S. textbooks. Second, during & after the War there was tremendous ethnic hatred directed at both Germans (”Huns) and Japanese (”Nips”). You just don’t see any of that now & haven’t for decades. Third, do Israeli textbooks mention any Israeli atrocities against Palestinians? The Nakba & expulsion of 700,000 Israeli Arabs during the 48 war? Deir Yassin? I strongly suspect that this material is either not covered or covered in such an attenuated way as to be virtually not covered.

I think anyone reading the comments on this thread can decide for themselves who, between the two of us, is willfully ignorant.

I’ll save you the trouble of asking. I will not be posting any more comments on this thread.

The clip from You Tube, while it was broadcast on Channel 10 is complete Palestine Media Watch propaganda. THe clip was uploaded to YouTube by PMW & it features Marcus as a representative of PMW. PMW is a group no diff. than CMIP, CAMERA, MEMRI or all the other anti-Palestinian media sites that exist. Not welcome here. As for your claims about the origin of the textbooks and the maps, only the newscaster makes these claims & it is impossible to tell fr the brief seconds of screen time where they are flashed before your eyes what the textbooks actually contain.

I just did a cursory review of the CMIP site & I noticed a few interesting items. Here is what it says about who it is:

The Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education–formerly referred to as the Center for Monitoring the Impact of Peace (CMIP)–is a non-profit, non-political international NGO founded in 1998. It is dedicated to fostering peaceful relations between peoples and nations by helping them accept the “Other” and reject violence as a means of resolving conflicts. To this end, it examines school curricula worldwide, especially throughout the Middle East, to determine whether the material conforms to international standards, and to analyze what is being taught with regard to recognition and acceptance of the “Other.”

CMIP is “non-political?” Who are they trying to fool??

I then reviewed the countries whose textbooks it has reviewed. CMIP has indeed reviewed Israeli textbooks–in 2002! Why has there been no review in the past six years when there are far more regular reviews of textbooks from Arab countries? Gee, I wonder why. As for the Israel review, here is what the executive summary concludes:

…No negative changes were noted in the new textbooks with regard to the image of the Arabs, the description of the conflict, the presentation of Islam, questions of war and peace and education to tolerance and conciliation. On the contrary, the positive trends noted in the earlier report have, if anything, been strengthened…

There you have it: Palestinian textbooks–a cesspool of hatred; and Israeli–pass with flying colors. No partisanship in that.

Incidentally, the war drums for a new war with Iran are beating ever so loud - as we all KNOW, the war will be “limited”, “surgical bombing strike”, “because of Iranian nukular program”.

I will now blogspam my blog here - feel free to remove the link if it is against the rules.
With that in mind, here is Kyra Phillips asking ‘The Longest Interview Question in the History of US TV “journalism”‘

http://americangoy.blogspot.com/2008/03/this-needs-posting.html

This is probably not totally off topic, so here goes:
I find it incredible that AIPAC and the rest of the pro-Israel lobby is what it is today - a monolithic bloc that works to censor, obfuscate and lie about issues (what is called “steering the discussion”) concerning Israel-Arab conflict.

They speak with one voice, a monolithic bloc…

Which is incredible, as the Jewish-Americans in the USA are all over the political spectrum, with anarchists co-mingling with staunch conservatives.

AIPAC and the pro-Israel lobby DOES NOT represent American-Jews AT ALL; rather, it is a foreign body working for a foreign government.

Anyway, that’s all I have to say.
Keep up keeping up and all that upper chin stuff!