The official school year opened in a partial and confusing manner today, due to the strike by one of Israel's two teachers unions. Roughly a million kindergarten and elementary school children began school normally this morning, but some 550,000 junior high and high school students are affected by the protest over the firing of several hundred teachers and the cutback in hours of 3,000 others. In many schools, teachers from both unions teach, leaving some classes intact, others canceled, and the students and teachers confused. Under consideration is a proposal to totally close all junior high schools until the strike is settled.
Police and other security forces are on high alert to ensure the day passes without incident.
Despite the morass, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Education Minister Limor Livnat visited the Ben-Tzvi school in Ramle, while President Moshe Katzav was a guest of an elementary school in the Israeli-Arab town of Abu Ghosh, between Mevaseret Tzion and Telz-Stone. Sharon expressed his pleasure and pride at hearing the children singing about peace, while Katzav said he "feels pain" whenever an innocent person is killed. The remarks were taken as referring to the incident outside Hevron in which IDF forces killed four Arabs at 3 AM this morning; see below.
Police and other security forces are on high alert to ensure the day passes without incident.
Despite the morass, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Education Minister Limor Livnat visited the Ben-Tzvi school in Ramle, while President Moshe Katzav was a guest of an elementary school in the Israeli-Arab town of Abu Ghosh, between Mevaseret Tzion and Telz-Stone. Sharon expressed his pleasure and pride at hearing the children singing about peace, while Katzav said he "feels pain" whenever an innocent person is killed. The remarks were taken as referring to the incident outside Hevron in which IDF forces killed four Arabs at 3 AM this morning; see below.