A study of Palestinian curricula, conducted by London-based NGO IMPACT-SE (the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education), found that the curriculum produced by the Palestinian Authority for Gaza pupils continues to incite students against Jews, while glorifying violence and martyrdom.
The curriculum was developed by the PA for Gaza students, who have not been able to return to school since the start of the Gaza War following the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas invasion of southern Israel.
The study detailed two major findings:
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1. The PA’s new “abridged curriculum” for Gaza replicates antisemitic material and content that incites hatred and violence.
2. Reopened schools in Gaza continue to use textbooks and teaching materials that incite hatred and violence.
The Palestinian Authority curriculum for Gaza continues to use antisemitic language, narratives and imagery. An 11th-grade history textbook contained an illustration of a hand bearing a Star of David gripping the globe, alluding to a supposed Zionist global control.
A lesson on statistics in a ninth-grade math exercise called for students to calculate the number of Palestinian “martyrs” of the conflicts with Israel. While a third-grade math lesson, meant to teach numerical writing, uses numbers and examples from the First Intifada.
The teaching material also glorifies violence against Jews and Israelis through the celebration of jihad, terrorism and martyrdom. A poem in one unit describes martyrs as climbing up a “mountain of their gushing blood.”
In the curriculum, jihad is described as “the peak of Islam” and presented as the duty of every Muslim whenever Islamic lands have been occupied by non-Muslims.
A page from a 12th-grade reading comprehension lesson features a poem about returning to Haifa, which says, “Haifa is sighing, do you not hear the sigh of Haifa? … If you come to her one day with a weapon in your hand.”
Other reading comprehension exercises in younger grades contain stories in which Israeli soldiers are the perpetrators of cruel acts of violence against Palestinians for pleasure.
Additionally, Israel as a political entity is completely absent from lessons on history and geography, where Israel does not appear on the maps of the territory, and cities are only listed by Arab names, with newer Israeli cities excluded completely.
Beyond the use of PA curriculum, which uses incitement, IMPACT-SE found that teachers and schools also practiced “indoctrination, reinforcing violent ideology and rejection of peaceful coexistence.”
They cited the example of Al-Nasr Elementary School in Gaza City, where students learned to recite a poem glorifying the Oct. 7 Hamas-led massacre.
“You are history, you are the Toufan [flood],” says one line from the poem, invoking the name Hamas gave to the massacre, “Al-Aqsa Flood.”
At Rufayda Al-Aslamiyya High School for Girls in Deir al-Balah, the walls of a classroom were covered with the names of “martyrs”, including members of the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas.
A video recorded in January 2025 at Al-Safa wal-Marwa School, a newly established school funded by the Sultanate of Oman, shows young girls dancing and chanting a song with the lyrics “We ignited the Intifada, with a stone and a knife” while making throat-slitting gestures. The students also sing “Challenge accepted, where are the Zionist and the soldier?”
The PA curriculum is being used to teach over 290,000 students aged 6 to 18 in Gaza following the delayed start of the 2024-2025 school year.
While the European Union had previously conditioned continued funding of the PA’s school curriculum on specific reforms and changes, IMPACT-SE found that those reforms have not been carried out.
“Ultimately, the European Union’s financial support, which is now conditioned on reform — has been funneled into a system that continues to indoctrinate children with messages of hatred, martyrdom, and incitement to violence,” the study said.
The study’s authors conclude with a comment about the missed opportunity to make meaningful change, meaning the cycle of violence is likely to continue.
“Rather than leveraging international funding and the reopening of schools as an opportunity for meaningful change, the PA has chosen to reinforce and institutionalize extremism in Palestinian education. Despite the destruction, suffering, and loss endured by Gaza’s population, the education system remains a tool for cultivating future generations steeped in violence rather than a bridge toward reconciliation. The continued prioritization of incitement over education not only betrays the commitments the PA made to international donors but also ensures that the cycle of conflict will persist, fueled by an education system designed to radicalize rather than educate.”
This article was originally published by All Israel News.
ALL ISRAEL NEWS is based in Jerusalem and is a trusted source of news, analysis and information from Israel to our Christian friends around the world.
