When discussing the Arab-Israel conflict my late wife and I always disagreed. She was a pessimist. She thought we would be at war with the Arabs for the next hundred years. I, on the other hand, was an optimist. I thought we would be at war with the Arabs for the next hundred years. This isn’t a semantics problem. The two sides have deeply entrenched ideas of how the situation came about, and equally deeply entrenched views about how it should end. Both start with the education they give their children.
The first practical step towards solving the current Arab-Israeli impasse is to make a major change in the educational environment. At the end of World War Two the victorious allies also recognized that the population of Germany needed to be taught that the Nazi Racist Aryan superiority theories that contributed to the worst horrors of that war had to be dealt with. Known Nazis were barred from public office and the schools began teaching a more liberal curriculum. Hitler’s racism had been the order of the day since his party took power in 1932. The schools had been teaching Aryan superiority for nearly a full generation. It would take another generation before some of the nations signed a final peace treaty. A similar, but probably more extensive, process is needed in the Middle East.
The United Nations that was established as an attempt at controlling future conflicts was created at the same time. One of many conflicts that were brought to the UN was the Arab Jewish struggle over the territory of Palestine. There was no branch of the UN at that time to deal with refugees from new wars. European refugees were referred to as ‘displaced persons’ (DPs) and most efforts concentrated on returning them to their former homes (even when the actual homes no longer existed). The urgency of finding a way to handle the “new” Arab refugee problem in a humanitarian way resulted in the creation of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). It was only after a few more months that a larger agency under the office of UN High Commissioner on Refugees (UNHCR) was created. Many felt that UNRWA would act as the UNHCR was directed, but the wording of the resolutions that created them were not alike. UNHCR was empowered to resettle or repatriate refugees. UNRWA concentrated on immediate care and the idea of resettling was NOT included. There are other problems in the structure of UNRWA and I will deal with them in future posts.
What is very clear now is that UNRWA is NOT a help in solving the Arab refugee problem. This is especially true in the field of education. It needs to be eliminated. This does not mean halting aid. It means channeling aid through UNHCR.
UNRWA employs some 30,000 people, mostly “Palestinian” refugees. The largest number work in UNRWA schools, where Arab children are taught to hate Jews (and others). Another area of UNRWA aid is medical and health care. Social Welfare, Camp Maintenance, and Aid Distribution are other areas. All will be covered soon.
Wetherhorn 