Teaching Holocaust is "crime against Palestinians," says Gaza group following report UN agency plans to re-introduce course.
By KHALED ABU TOAMEHPalestinian kids sit at UNRWA school 370(photo credit: REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa)
Hamas on Wednesday reiterated its strong opposition to teaching about the Holocaust in Gaza Strip schools run by the UN Relief and Works Agency.The Refugee Affairs Department of Hamas said that teaching the Holocaust was a “crime against the issue of the refugees that is aimed at canceling their right of return.”The Hamas statement came in response to unconfirmed reports in a number of Arab media outlets that UNRWA was planning to reintroduce the Holocaust into its school curriculum.UNRWA teachers in Jordan also announced this week their strong opposition to teaching the Holocaust in their schools.Hamas called on UNRWA to stop “passing suspicious projects in the context of services it provides to Palestinian refugees.” The children at UNRWA schools don’t need material about the Holocaust, Hamas said. “Rather, they need to be re-taught the history and geography of Palestine as a basic subject. The children are entitled to learn about the massacres perpetrated by the Zionist enemy against the Palestinians since the Nakba [disaster].”Hamas appealed to all political forces, civil societies and UNRWA teachers in the Gaza Strip to “confront these suspicious projects and reject them.”
