Education Minister Yuli Tamir's order to return the Green Line to maps of Israel in new textbooks was met with a firestorm of protest including a rabbinical decree against using the new textbooks. Tamir, a former member of the Peace Now group, ordered her staff to ensure that textbook maps show the pre-1967 borders that separate Judea, Samaria, and Gaza from the rest of Israel. “How can we demand that the Arab world recognize our borders if we don’t recognize the June 1967 borders,” she asked.
Protests came from both sides of the political spectrum, beginning with a panel of rabbis who handed down a Jewish legal decree (psak, Halacha) forbidding students from using the new textbooks, according to Israel Radio.
Tamir responded by referring to confiscation of textbooks containing maps that include the Green Line as a Kabbalistic “pulsa de nura.” The reference, translated from the Aramaic as “whip of fire,” calls upon the angels of destruction to block heavenly forgiveness of the subject’s sins, cause his or her death, and rain down upon him or her all the curses named in the Bible.
The Education Minister claimed that any decision made on this issue is a political one, but also insisted that she had made the changes in the interest of improving Israeli education. “We teach, for instance, about United Nations Resolution 242, but we don't show students the Green Line. We cannot deny that there used to be a border that is still being debated today,” she said.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said he spoke with Tamir about the order, but he stopped short of criticizing her decision. “There is nothing wrong with marking the Green Line. But there is an obligation to emphasize that the government’s position and public consensus rule out returning to 1967 lines,” he said.
Two former director-generals of the Education Ministry, from two different political parties, each had harsh criticism for Tami, however: Zevulun Orlev and Ronit Tirosh. Orlev, chairman of the National Union-National Religious Party, said the education minister was imposing her "Peace Now" ideology on the ministry. He called upon Olmert to “put the brakes on the Peace Now policy in the education ministry blatantly dictated by Minister Tamir.”
Kadima Knesset [Parliament] member Tirosh criticized Tamir’s declaration as well. “She has overstepped her authority. The education minister is not permitted to interfere with the content of textbooks and should have consulted with the other members of the Knesset before making such changes,” she said.
The Likud faction charged Tamir with changing the national curriculum to fit her own political agenda, adding that she had ignored both the Jerusalem Law and the Golan Heights Law in order to make the changes. The faction also introduced a no-confidence motion over the proposal.
Two former education ministers also weighed in with comments about the new plan. Former Meretz Party head Yossi Sarid said, “Israeli students must know that Israel’s borders, both in the north and the east, are not final and will be determined by negotiations.”
National Union Knesset member Rabbi Yitzchak Levy, who served as education minister from 1989 to1998 added his voice to the chorus of dissent, saying he did not approve of Tamir’s stance on placing all of Judea and Samaria up for grabs in keeping with Arab and Palestinian Authority demands to turn the entire area into an independent Arab state.
“Tamir is trying to force her political opinions upon the students of Israel. Previous education ministers kept the ministry free of political decisions of this nature.” Levy said.
(By Arutz Sheva, IsraelNationalNews.com, December 5, 2006)
Prayer Focus
Textbooks and school children have become a major battlefield for politicians on each side of the Israeli–Palestinian contest. Pray that wise heads will prevail, and that educators will educate without the hindrance of a political agenda.
Scripture
“Teach me Your way, O LORD, and lead me in a smooth path, because of my enemies” (Psalm 27:11).
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