Kalashnikov classes for Gazan children. Their names? Sword and War
Il Giornale, April 30th, 2013
Gaza schoolboys are trained to use Kalashnikovs. A children television station teaches them to “kill Jew dogs”
They start very early, even before their birth, considered so many children being born to families in the great Islamic world end up being called Warrior, Conqueror, Holy War, Sword … Sword of Islam (Saif al Islam) as Gaddafi’s son was called, and Sword of Law (Saif al Din), or else Saif Allah, Sword of Allah. Fatullah for instance means “Victory in the name of Allah”, its Turkish version being Fethullah (this is well summarized by a worried and very good American scholar, Harold Rhode), along with plenty of other names from the roots Fathi, or Fatih, which indeed means victory. On the contrary some children are named Jamil (handsome) or Latif (friendly) or Wasim (graceful) o Karim or Jawad (generous). Of course you cannot put everyone in the same basket, but on the other hand we do name our kids Hope, Benjamin, or else they are named after Saints inspiring good sentiments, like the four evangelists and or Saint Francis.
Is there a reason to all of this? Sure, there is epic poetry, a mindset, an ideology, all of which would simply remain unassailable folklore and tradition if this were a mock war, not real war.
It gets worrying as soon as this mindset instilled in children turns into school, television, and civil teachings. Gazan teenagers learn at school, as part of their school curriculum, how to use Kalashnikovs as well as shoulder-fired rockets and anti-tank RPGs that we then see pouring down on Israeli towns. They are trained by instructors appointed by the Interior Ministry, assisted in its very "scientific" aspect by the Izz al-Din al Qassam brigades, the notorious armed wing of Hamas, which by the way was never actually known to possess any other wings. Pupils also are taught civic activities, like fire-fighting; but a video shot at the Gamal Abdel Nasser school shows an assault with RPGs being launched against a mocked-up watchtower bearing an Israeli flag. The weekly classes are addressed to 37 thousand pupils. The course is supplemented with summer camps with courses on explosives and weapons.
Now, how is it possible to envisage a peace process with a young leadership educated by this school curriculum? As a matter of fact, this education involves not only practice, but also a great deal of theory. The scandal, for istance, of the Italian funds to the textes of the Palestinian Authority is still indelible: the Italy financed school books turned out to be full of hatred. In 2008 the most popular character in the Palestinian children station was Farfur, a Mickey Mouse clone who is brutally murdered by Israeli soldiers after the following exchange: Farfur: “Sanabel, what do you want to do to help the Al Aqsa Mosque?” Little boy: “We want to fight.” Farfur: “And what else?” “We want to wipe out the Jews”. After Farfur is massacred, a three year old girl interviewed said “We don’t like Jews, because they are dogs! We will fight them!” Another little girl in the studio replied “Oh Shaima, you are right, the Jews are criminals and our enemies.”
Anti-Semitic and war children education is so wide-spread, just log on the PMW, Palestinian Media Watch, a website which collects poems, songs, articles, and teachings. Summer camps, like several squares and streets, are named after terrorists who slew civilians in restaurants or on busses.
A recent video produced by the Center for Near East Policy Research shows that the UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency), the UN organization which, unlike all others only takes care of one kind only of refugees, i.e. Palestinians, spends $500 million each year on schools, and considered the results these funds are totally misplaced. The video reveals that coexistence with Israel is not being taken into consideration. On the contrary, school children are taught to shout out every morning "Glory and eternal life to the martyrs and the righteous, Jerusalem is ours, we will liberate it." Many teachers explain that "Israel must be wiped out" and that its citizens are all "occupiers." Two clips show children under 10 years of age talking about the need to kill the Jews, defining them the enemy of Allah, saying “We must kill all of them”.
Before the beginning of the Second Intifada, which unleashed ferocious terror, Arafat called on thousands of children to march on Jerusalem with a blissful smile, stating it would have been the most beautiful deed in the world. Unfortunately, children policies have not changed ever since, and they are being funded by us by not demanding an appropriate reporting of these funds. If peace is to be made, the starting point is schools