![]() ![]() The fears expressed by the Minister of Education were confirmed: Larger towns were even divided into several ‘military security zones’ and separated by internal checkpoints. Curfews and closures remain in place and/or were re-imposed on most towns, refugee camps, and many villages in the West Bank. ![]() There has been continuous destruction of homes, agriculture, and other private and public property like shops, offices, workshops, and service institutions.ĭespite all efforts and hopes for better conditions, the new school year took off badly for the majority of children in the West Bank, who have been physically prevented from attending their schools during almost the entire first month of the new school year - except in Bethlehem and Gaza - which are now re-occupied again and/or under continuous heavy military attack. Many neighbourhoods, especially densely populated urban centres, refugee camps and poor villages, suffered recurrent military incursions, bombardments, extra judicial executions combined with indiscriminate killing and injury of civilians (nearly half of them children), as well as nightly intrusions of soldiers into private homes, arrests and brutalisation of family members. Most of these children, especially in the northern West Bank, spent their extended 2-3 month ‘summer break’ imprisoned at home under strict military curfews and external closures. High school final year tawjihi (General High School Examination) students suffered particular difficulties during the whole year of preparation, and the scheduled examinations were disrupted by military operations and postponed for over a month. Scores of teachers and students were unable to commute between the rural villages and the urban centres before and after the invasion. Approximately 50% of school children and 35,000 employees in the education sector were prevented from reaching their schools. 1289 schools were closed for at least 3 consecutive weeks during the Israeli invasion between March 29 and up till the end of the school year. 17 teachers and staff in the education sector were killed and 71 were arrested. 216 students were killed, 2514 injured, and 164 arrested. By the end of the 2001-2002 school year, the Ministry of Education reported that : The school system was not spared this destruction. The past academic year was particularly traumatic as spiralling poverty gripped the nation, and as environmental and infrastructural destruction, home and institutional demolition, death, injury, disability and arrest of loved ones as well as the Israeli military reoccupation of the entire West Bank became the new and ongoing way of life. Today, two years into the Second Palestinian Uprising (intifada), resistance and re-occupation, the education system is near collapse again, leaving yet another generation of young Palestinians without proper schooling, the essential tool that is to prepare them for their challenging role in rehabilitating their society and building its future state. Only seven years ago, the newly established Palestinian Ministry of Education and the Palestinian community began to confront the huge task of reconstructing and rehabilitating the education sector, which had been left in shambles by the Israeli ‘Civil Administration’ through deliberate obstruction and neglect. The new school year was scheduled to begin on August 31st 2002 for over one million Palestinian children, comprising more than a third of the total population in West Bank and Gaza Strip. Institute of Community and Public Health, Birzeit University Rita Giacaman, Anita Abdullah, Rula Abu Safieh and Luna Shamieh The Ramallah/al-Bireh/Beitunia Urban Center ![]()
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