Sent: Tuesday, May
15, 2001 11:14 PM
Subject: Who
is Teaching School Children Hatred and
Racism?
Canada Palestine
Association
POBox, 1085,
Halifax,NS, B3J
2X1
The Hon. Mr. Stockwell Day,
MP
The House of
Commons.
15 May, 2001
Dear Mr. Day:
Further to my letter of May
13, and in reference to your recent address to the
Canadian Jewish Congress, I would like to refer further
to one of the many falsehoods in your address.
You spoke of :
"Palestinian schools still teach their children
from textbooks that can only be described as being
overtly antisemitic". I described, in my earlier
letter, this statement as totally false. Palestinians,
like other Arabs, are Semites and have lived in peace
with Jews for centuries in peace and tolerance. Their
antipathy is against Zionism and not Jews. Furthermore,
I challenged you to look at what racism Israeli leaders
propagate against Palestinians and Arabs, and I
challenged you to look at what they teach their children
in their textbooks. To assist you in this endeavour, I
am forwarding to you[ separately] a
study carried out by Professor Daniel Bar-Tal, of Tel
Aviv University in Israel, and published in
The Washington Report for Middle East
Affairs, in Sep. 1999. His study details
the abusive offensive language used in Israeli textbooks
against Palestnians and Arabs in general, indoctrinating
children with racism and hatred against Arabs; true
antisemitism, to use your
expression.
I call on you to withdraw
your statements and apologise for the offensive charges
against an innocent people who have suffered
dispossession and ethnic cleansing, that have been
neglected by the nations of the world, that claim to
have concern for human rights.
Yours
sincerely
Ismail Zayid,
MD
President, Canada Palestine
Association
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