Education Minister Naftali Bennett says that while he was not involved in the decision to disqualify from high school curricula a book that depicts a love story between an Israeli and a Palestinian, he wholeheartedly backs the rejection.
The Education Ministry announced Wednesday that Israeli author Dorit Rabinyan’s “Gader Haya” (translated as “Borderlife” in English) had been rejected for inclusion.
“I read parts of the book,” Bennett says in an interview with Channel 2. “It presents IDF soldiers as sadistic war criminals, comparing them to the fighters of Hamas, and there’s a [romantic] affair between an Israeli and a former [Palestinian] security prisoner.”
Teachers had requested the book’s inclusion in the ministry’s reading list but its content was deemed unfit for high school students.
“Do we want to push that IDF soldiers are sadists?” Bennett adds. “Is this what 18-year-olds ahead of army service should learn?”
A ministry spokeswoman was quoted by the Haaretz daily Wednesday as saying the book was rejected because it could undermine the “separate identities” of Jews and Arabs.
Bennett did not comment on the spokeswoman’s specific rationalization for the book’s rejection.
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