Nevertheless, the Israeli government refused to bite the bul- br

let. In reply to Arab Knesset member Zeidan Atshe’s demand br

for an upgrading of the Arab schools, Education Ministry br

Director-General Eliezer Shmueli announced on September 27, br

1978, that he had taken schooling in the Arab sector under his br

personal care. The ministry, despite budget problems, an- br

nounced that it would spend an extra IL 20 million on Arab br

education.

Earlier, in June 1976, the first twenty-four Arab women br

graduates received their diplomas and licenses as Arab elemen- br

tary school teachers from the David Yellin Hebrew Teachers br

College in Jerusalem. The program was sponsored and paid for br

by the Education Ministry, which was anything but lax in its br

diligent efforts to produce the educated and intellectual Arabs br

who would lead the struggle to do away with the David Yellin br

Hebrew Teachers College, the Israeli Education Ministry—and br

Israel.

Thus, Prime Minister Begin’s adviser on Arab affairs, the br

Ministry of Education, and the Jewish Agency announced, in br

March 1978, that a new state-financed fund had been set up to br

award one hundred scholarships to outstanding Arab university br

students. Studies were being made, it was announced, to widen br

the scope of the fund to cover outstanding Israeli Arab high school br

students as well, if enough Jewish money could be found.

The most powerful weapon the PLO has in Israel is the br

education provided by Jews, with Jewish money, for the Israeli br

Arabs. The Jewish state trains teachers who, increasingly, either br

teach or turn a deaf ear to strident Arab nationalism. And how br

could it be different? In 1937 the British Palestine Royal Com- br

mission Report claimed that Arab teachers were turning govern- br

ment schools into “seminaries of Arab nationalism.” A former br

Arab education official in Palestine wrote: “An Arab teacher br

could not, even with a severe stretch of the imagination, have br

been expected to foster loyalty to a government that, in his opin- br

ion, was daily undermining the national existence of his people” br

(A. L. Tibawi, Arab Education in Mandatory Palestine).

The very same words could be—and are—said by Arab br

teachers serving under the Jewish government of Israel. And br

they, actively and passively, train the new, educated, hostile, br

hating generation of the PLO.