[Elder of Ziyon] Tennessee textbooks downplay terrorism, classify Hamas et. al. as "political parties"

From Washington Times:

Several Tennessee parents are outraged over a textbook distributed in their children's high school "human geography" class that suggest Hamas, Hezbollah and the PLO are political parties.

One statement from the 10th edition of "The Cultural Landscape: An Introduction to Human Geography" textbook was most alarming to one of the parents, Hugh Nemets, who is Jewish.

"If a Palestinian suicide bomber kills several dozen Israeli teenagers in a Jerusalem restaurant, is that an act of terrorism or wartime retaliation against Israeli government policies and army actions?" the book asks.

Nemets said, "It smells of anti-Semitism to me. It opened the door to legitimizing terror," Mr. Nemets told Nashville's News 2.

He is one of 10 Williamson County parents who voiced their concerns at a board meeting earlier last week.

A Williamson County school district spokesperson told the station that the book was selected from a list given to them by the State Department of Education.

Parents concerned about the textbooks can submit a formal written complaint. The school district told Nashville's News 2 it has not yet received any such complaint.

WKRN, Nashville News, Nashville Weather and Sports

Glancing at an online version of sections from the book, I see other issues. It has a ton of information about Islam but very little about Judaism.

It includes a few problematic questions:

The Western Wall in Jerusalem remains an effective boundary between:
	Jews and Muslims Armenians and Jews Christians and Jews Muslims and Christians

Two problems: it doesn't describe the Kotel at all as to its importance, and it implies that Jews have no business on their holiest site.

Another:

Using this diffusion map of religion, the hearths of the three religions illustrated in this map are
	Palestine, Syria, and Japan. Palestine, Mecca, and China. Mecca, Palestine, and India. none of the above.

"Palestine"?  Is that where Judaism and Christianity came from? Funny, I don't think Jesus ever used that term.

I wish that full textbooks were online - I'm sure that there is a ton of bias that is evident, but it takes a lot of effort to find it.

(h/t Einfal)

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Posted By Elder of Ziyon to Elder of Ziyon at 4/24/2013 11:30:00 AM