Egypt gets rid of much of the antisemitism in school textbooks

This story from YNet did not get the publicity it should be getting:

A newly released study showed Egypt was successful in removing antisemitism and other hatred from its school books, The Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education (IMPACT-se) found. The research and policy institute that analyzes curricula around the world through UNESCO-defined standards, has released its second full report on the Egyptian curriculum, from its London office.

This latest IMPACT-se report evaluated 271 textbooks from the Egyptian national curricula, published between 2018 and 2023. The study focuses on the Arabic language, Islamic and Christian religious education, social studies, values and respect for others, history, geography, philosophy, and more. Egypt has the largest education system in the Middle East and North Africa, with 25 million children currently enrolled in its schools - the largest in the Arab world.

"Our findings show major improvements in attitudes toward Jews and Judaism in the revised textbooks, part of the year-by-year reform of the Egyptian national curriculum between 2018-2030 across all grades, which has already reached Grade 5," IMPACT-se said. 

"Promisingly, elementary school textbooks rewritten since 2021 do not include traditional, harmful antisemitic stereotypes such as attributing evil deeds and negative traits like disloyalty, fraud, greediness, and violation of contracts to Jewish people. These were replaced with values of tolerance and coexistence between Islam and Judaism, highlighting common ground such as Islam's recognition of the Torah, and permission for Muslims to eat Kosher food."

Students are required to memorize the provisions of the peace treaty, and describe the “advantages of peace for Egypt and the Arab states.” A photograph of the peace treaty signing at the White House is shown for the first time. Passages such as “recognition of the sovereignty of each side in the conflict over its territory” were changed to “respect by each side of the other’s sovereignty and independence,” and establishing “normal relations” between the two countries, was changed to establishing “friendly relations.”

The article notes that it is not all great; older grades still use the older textbooks with explicit antisemitism, and even in the new ones students are taught that it is an Islamic duty to end the "occupation" which appears to include all of Israel based on the map they still use.

But even so, this is a very positive change. Egypt is just about the most antisemitic nation there is and the indoctrination in the textbooks is part of the reason why.

IMPACT-SE has not yet published the complete study

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