A group of parents of students at the Jerusalem High School Adjoining Hebrew University (acronym Leyad"a) complained of a teacher using a textbook that presents "the Palestinian narrative" and that is banned from use by the Education Ministry.
The parents say there is a teacher who brings excerpts from the book The Dual Narrative as part of his lectures.
In conversation with Arutz Sheva, one of the parents said, "There's a fairly clear narrative in the school that presents the Palestinian side as the weak and just side, and the Israelis as the occupying side. This is usually presented as an unbalanced discussion in which there is a right side and a wrong side."
He added, "The children were given photocopied pages from the book The Dual Narrative." In addition, the parents said one of the teachers refused to call Hamas a terror organization and even refused to call it a distinctly anti-Israel organization.
However, school Principal Erez Hacker denies the claim: "The school outright rejects the claims and clarifies that the school does not teach the book attributed to it, The Dual Narrative. The school teaches only approved books. As part of history and citizenship studies, the school refers to different narratives while presenting all the positions related to the subject."
The school principal's response was presented to the complaining parents, however the latter insisted that although the school does not actually teach from the book The Dual Narrative, and it is not a required textbook, there is at least one teacher who has brought excerpts from it in his lessons in recent years.
Im Tirtzu Movement head Matan Peleg, who fights politicization within the education system and in higher education, said: "Extreme anti-Zionist content has no place in the education system of the State of Israel. The future of the State depends on believing in the rightness of the way of the society one lives in and the attempt to undermine that faith is tantamount to real harm to its institutions. In addition, it's also a violation of the law. Section 17 of the State Education Act prohibits the introduction of political elements into schools. We call on Education Minister Yoav Galant to intervene urgently and immediately and stop this disgrace. Find out how this content has infiltrated the school and by whom and impose the necessary sanctions on him."
The Ministry of Education has not responded.