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V.
Conclusion
The East Jerusalem school system suffers from
severely substandard conditions. The educational infrastructure lacks
sufficient classroom space, resulting in overcrowding and a high pupils
per classroom ratio. Without proper lighting and visual aids, the
atmosphere in most classrooms is unsuitable for education. Schools have
inadequate facilities, lacking libraries, computer laboratories, science
laboratories, and facilities for the arts and physical education. Schools
have insufficient amounts of equipment, like computers. Those facilities
that are available are substandard and learning materials are poorly
distributed.
Resulting from insufficient availability of vocational training, the
education system fails to channel students into appropriate academic and
vocational programs. Students better suited for vocational training lack
motivation when placed in academic tracks. They cause a breakdown in
discipline, consume valuable learning materials, and impair the ability of
teachers to teach.
To compensate for the classroom shortage, the government rents space in
apartments and homes. These spaces suffer from overcrowding, poor
sanitation and ventilation, and structural dilapidation. Schools also
create additional classrooms by converting bomb shelters, teachers’
lounges and valuable library, science and computer facilities. Materials
from these facilities remain in storage, unused and unusable.
These conditions raise many human rights issues. The State of Israel
appears to violate international law by not providing ample classroom
space and vocational training. But, more disconcerting, Israel seems to
discriminate between Jewish and Palestinian students by providing West
Jerusalem students with superior facilities. This suggests that Israel
discriminates against Palestinian children based on their national
identity.
One cannot rationalize these inequities by arguing that Israel provides
Jewish children with better facilities because Jewish citizens pay more
taxes. Palestinian Jerusalemites pay taxes at the same rates as their
Jewish counterparts accounting for 26 percent of municipal tax revenue.
[i]
Yet Palestinians receive only about 5 percent of municipal services.[ii]
The Wholistic Project, intended to resolve these disparities, is tacit
recognition of their existence. While the project brings much needed
change to the school system, it cannot succeed without providing a
dramatic increase in the number of classrooms and availability of
vocational training. The system requires, first and foremost, the ability
to absorb all children wishing to enter, and it must be able to channel
them into appropriate academic and vocational streams. Having done so,
administrators and teachers can more easily maintain discipline. When the
system has absorbed all of the students, schools must provide a
stimulating learning environment and the proper facilities for a modern
education.
Not only is the Wholistic Project unlikely to succeed, it comes only now,
as Palestinian and Israel negotiators enter final status negotiations.
When negotiations are concluded, the education system in East Jerusalem
may very well fall under the authority of the PNA. Since the Wholistic
Project will probably not make dramatic improvements to the educational
infrastructure in East Jerusalem, the PNA will face tremendous obstacles
in educating Palestinian Jerusalemites. Assuming there will be a
Palestinian state, the PNA will have to devote substantial resources to
the East Jerusalem education system during the costly, state-building
process.
Why did the Wholistic Project come so late? Israel has been responsible
for the East Jerusalem education system for 33 years. Is the Ministry of
Education just beginning to realize its obligations in East Jerusalem?
Are such efforts political lip service to the international community?
For all of Israel’s rhetoric about an undivided capital, why has Israel
not made the effort to unite the two sides of the city by offering East
Jerusalemites the same benefits and services offered to West
Jerusalemites? If Palestinians pay 26 percent of the municipal taxes, why
do they receive only 5 percent of municipal benefits? As (Abu-A’zzam’s)
son, Abed, put it, “With all these settlements they built, they couldn’t
build a school over here?”
Writer of the report (a profile)
Evan S. Weiss, is a fourth year student at Brown University in Providence,
Rhode Island. He will be graduating in May 2001 with a bachelors degree in
Middle East Studies. In addition to his voluntary internship in the PHRMG
offices in East Jerusalem, Evan also worked in the Middle East/North
Africa Division at Human Rights Watch in Washington, UAS.
[i]
Badil. Eviction from Jerusalem: Restitution and the Protection of
Palestinian Rights. Badil, Bethlehem, 1999. p. 20 as cited in
Kahn, Azra. Op Cit. p. 18.
[ii]
Badil. Op Cit. as cited in Kahn, Azra. Op Cit. p. 18.
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