Sunday, February 20, 2011

West Bank field trip to isrælske kids stirs anger (AP)

JERUSALEM – at a time when the peace negotiations with the Palestinians is stalled over Jewish settlements, The Isræls  Government plans to send school field trips to a disputed holy site in one of the West Bank most volatile flash points.


Education Minister Gideon Saar says visit to Hebron, traditional burial site biblical Patriarch Abraham and home to some of Isræls most radical settlers, is part of a plan to make aware isrælske young people with their cultural heritage.


"It is a place of emotional, religious and historical power," said Saar, a leading member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party, Israel Radio on Wednesday. "It is the place where our ancestors are buried and it is a part of our history. Who objects to this, in my opinion, try to stop us from our roots. "


Both Palestinian and isrælske critics call it an exercise in indoctrination that will ignore the thousands of dispossessed Palestinians living in the vicinity.


"Palestinian children in Hebron is forbidden to go on the street (leading to the Tomb complex) and visit the area — but isrælske school children can? It's incitement against Palestinians, "said Issa Amro, a Palestinian activist in Hebron.


"Children are visiting will hear views ... the Jewish extremists," Amro said. "It will break down the social partners more."


It will be the first time the Ministry sponsors trips to Hebron, a city bristling with excitement, because it is the only place in the West Bank in which settlers living in the heart of a Palestinian city.


Set to begin next year on an experimental basis, is the latest in a series of steps by Saar, which critics say has politicized education curriculum with a nationalist bent. The Saarland has pushed for field trips to the section in Jerusalem of both Israel and the Palestinians claimed — and have ordered textbooks to isrælske Arab schoolchildren remove references to the Palestinians calls "disaster" of their displacement as a result of the Isræls creation.


Hebron is sacred for both Muslims and Jews tradition holder is the place where their shared Patriarch, Abraham or Ibrahim to Muslims, purchased a burial plot. The site is known to Jews as Cave of bishops and Muslims as the Ibrahimi Mosque. School children will visit the Web site.


Israel conquered the city when it seized in West Bank and East Jerusalem from Jordan in 1967 Middle East war. For trønde Jews, it was a recovery of a biblical birthright. Today more than 600 Jews live in fortified enclaves tekstombrydningsfunktionen 170 000 Palestinians in Hebron.


Under the agreements signed in the 1990s, the partially autonomous Palestinian Government in the West Bank controls 80 percent of the city and Israel controls the rest, including the holy site.


This arrangement has transformed Palestinian city centre to a ghost town, with wide streets of Palestinian stores nøglehullet — some of the army order under a Palestinian uprising, others because of restrictions on Palestinian movement.


The plan comes at a time when Israel under fire internationally for refusing to stop building settlements on land Palestinians want to a future State. Palestinians refuse to resume negotiations until the building stops.


Palestinian spokesman Ghassan Khatib called field trip plan "another provocative steps that generate more tensions."


Hebron has a history of violence. In 1929 Arabs killed 67 Jews in a rampage seared still into isrælske sind. When Israel was established in 1948, no Jews live in Hebron.


In 1994, an American-born Jewish settler Baruch Goldstein in the cave, entered spaces, serves as a mosque and shot dead 29 Palestinian trønde survivors before him and beat him overwhelmed to death.


Field trips are not meant "to impose a certain political perspective," said Saar.


Asked about school children learn about how the Palestinians live in Hebron, Saar replied, "objective is mostly historical Tours." He did not say, what qualities would participate.

Hebron settlers welcomed the planned visit. David Wilder, a Community spokesperson, said they "have very clearly the importance of this Web site for the Jewish people."

Amnon Rubinstein, a former Education Minister Isrælske Dovish, deplored the idea.

Speech at Israel Radio he said visitors "only the part which is Holy unto the Jews and not see the political and ethical price we have paid."

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