About 450,000 Arab students from public and private schools are staying home on September 7, 2015 in solidarity with the 47 Church schools who have been on strike since the start of the school year on September 1st. The strike was called in protest of the discriminatory allocation of the education budget against the non-Jewish schools.
Formerly, Churchschools in Israel, which fall into the category of “recognized but unofficial”, received 65% of their budgets from the state, but that figure was cut to 34 percent two years ago. The rest of the school’s budget is covered by tuition costs which have increasingly become a costly burden to the Arab families. In contrast, the Orthodox Jewish schools in Israel which are also “recognized and unofficial” receive 100% of their budget from the state.
The Church schools have had several meetings in the Knesset with MKs and legal advocates about the education budget in Israel, many of which were attended and supported by the Mossawa Center; yet the talks have not yielded any results. The church schools are demanding that 100 percent of its budget, that is 200 million NIS a year, be allocated by the State budget, as is seen with the Jewish Orthodox schools; this would allow them to discontinue the tuition costs altogether and thus lessen the burden of education costs of the Arab minority. However, the Education Ministry has only offered 20 million NIS a year.The Monday strike is following a demonstration that took place Sunday September 6, 2015, in front of the prime minister’s office in Jerusalem, where thousands from the Arab community rallied to demand more funds for Church schools. The demonstration took place at the same time as a government meeting in the Prime Ministers offices.As a consequence of the failed negotiations during this meeting the Arab Mayors Council launched the school strike on Septembember 7th.
Arab Israelis protesting in solidarity with the church schools
A meeting of the Arab Mayors Council/Association to discuss the future strategy in the budget allocation debate is to be held on September 8th.
Jafar Farah, the Director of the Mossawa Center stated that this is an issue affecting the whole Palestinian Community in Israel rather than only the private school sector.
The education budget is just one example of the many discriminatory policies that the Arab community faces.
Pictured below is a decaying building which belongs to the “Hawar” public elementary school, in downtown Haifa. The conditions of the school, such as overcrowded classrooms and squares are a direct threat to safety of its students. Despite numerous requests on behalf of the school administration, neither the city municipality nor the Ministry of Education have addressed the school’s needs. The Parents Association of the school called for the school to go on strike last Tuesday; however they returned their children to school today after undergoing pressure from the Ministry of Education.
The Mossawa Center’s new research paper, written by the Economic Department at the Mossawa Center, demonstrates that the proposed budget for 2015-2016 ignores the basic prerequisites of Arab society put forth by the National Committee of the Heads of Arab Localities (NCALC).
For More information, contact the Mossawa Center.
