According to the IMPACT-se watchdog group’s investigation, the concept of jihad as a religious obligation is a central theme in the new curriculum, teaching students from a young age that martyrdom is a path to divine reward.
By Ailin Vilches Arguello, The Algemeiner
A recently implemented curriculum in Gaza schools, sanctioned by the Palestinian Authority (PA), glorifies the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, praises terrorists who killed children, and promotes antisemitic stereotypes, according to a new report.
The Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education (IMPACT-se), a nonprofit organization that analyzes schoolbooks and curricula around the world, has released a new report analyzing the recently introduced Gaza curriculum produced by the PA, revealing it violates Palestinian commitments made to donor countries for educational reform.
Last year, the PA committed to the European Union that it would reform its educational content to fully align with UNESCO’s standards of peace and tolerance in education, in exchange for continued EU funding.
Despite international expectations for reform, the IMPACT-se study shows that the 2025 educational curriculum “fails to meet basic international educational standards,” with the new textbooks promoting antisemitic narratives, glorifying violence, and even celebrating the mass murders carried out during the Hamas-led Oct. 7 invasion of southern Israel.
According to the new report, the 2024-2025 curriculum, which is being taught to nearly 300,000 Palestinian school children in grades 1-12 across Gaza, erases the State of Israel from the map and is filled with “graphic depictions of violence.”
For example, students are taught in geography and civics lessons that cities like Tel Aviv and Haifa are identified as Palestinian, promoting the belief that Israel’s existence is illegitimate.
Some of these textbooks openly glorify the Oct. 7 attacks, referring to the attackers as “heroes” and “symbols of pride,” celebrating the single deadliest assault on the Jewish people since the Holocaust.
“We see again that the PA continues to deeply embed hatred and violence in its curriculum and brazenly continues to teach antisemitism, the glorification of terrorism, and the dehumanization of Israelis,” IMPACT-se CEO Marcus Sheff said in a statement.
“Palestinian classrooms remain a breeding ground for extremism, with new educational materials reinforcing the same old dangerous narratives,” he added.
The study also reveals how PA-sanctioned educational materials promote antisemitic narratives and imagery. In an 11th-grade history textbook, the ancient stereotype of Jews controlling the world is perpetuated through an image of a hand with a Star of David gripping a globe.
In another example, an Islamic education textbook depicts “the Jews” as “deceitful, immoral manipulators who are hostile to Islam.”
According to the IMPACT-se watchdog group’s investigation, the concept of jihad as a religious obligation is a central theme in the new curriculum, teaching students from a young age that martyrdom is a path to divine reward. Starting in 1st grade, martyrs are glorified as having divine status.
The PA’s remote learning program for both Gaza and Hamas-run schools continues to promote hate and violence, with new materials even teaching science and math in ways that fuel hatred of Israel, the study finds.
For example, in a 3rd-grade math exercise, students are asked to write the number of martyrs killed during the violent First Intifada against Israel. In a 9th-grade statistics lesson, students are asked to calculate the number of “martyrs” killed by Israel.
The report finds that students are encouraged to view violence against Israel as a noble and necessary duty. In such textbooks, terrorists like Dalal Mughrabi, who led the 1978 Coastal Road massacre that killed 38 Israelis – including 13 children – are celebrated as role models.
In another example from earlier this year, a video shows young girls performing a nationalistic dance with throat-slitting gestures. The song playing in the background includes the lyrics, “We ignited the intifada, with a stone and a knife,” while the girls chant enthusiastically, “Challenge accepted, where are the Zionist and the soldier?”