The EU will also host on Monday the EU-Palestinian Authority High Level Donor Group, that is expected to include funding announcements and statements on the required Palestinian school textbooks reforms.
IMPACT-se, the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education (IMPACT-se), an international research and policy organization that monitors and analyzes education around the world, has just completed an in-depth review of the actual revised’ Palestinian textbooks the Europea, Commission has shared with the members of the European Parliament as evidence of reform. IMPACT-se told the European Jewish Press that ‘’the claims of reform simply are not supported by the material. ‘’Core content promoting hate, violence, antisemitism and the earsure of Israel remains intact, and in mqany cases the changes are merely cosmetic.’’
European Union Foreign Ministers will discuss Monday several options to restrict trade from Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank).
The options have been prepared by the European Commission which has been pressed by EU’s foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas over the lmast few weeks to come out with proposals to reduce imports ‘’from illegal Israeli settlements’’ at the request of several EU member states.
According to media reports , among the ideas being considered are an import licensing system, whereby goods would need special permission to be exported to the EU, tariffs targeting goods originating in the settlements; or an outright ban on imports from them.
The Commmission has been so far reluctant to draft seach trade measures, reflecting the tension between the EU’s executive body and the European External Action Service (EEAS) on foreign policy and especially the Middle East. According to Euractiv, the leaked paper prepared by the Commission suggests the EU should frame the move as foreign policy sanctions, which require the unanimous approval of the 27 EU member states to agree them, a steeper threshold than trade measures require.
Palestine Donor Group meeting
Also on Monday, the EU will host in Brussels the EU-Palestinian Authority High Level Donor Group, that is expected to include funding announcements and statements on the required Palestinian school textbooks reforms. The meeting of the Palestine Donor Group will be co-chaired by European Commissioner fort he Mediterranean Dubravska Suica and Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa.
IMPACT-se, the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education (IMPACT-se), an international research and policy organization that monitors and analyzes education around the world, has just completed an in-depth review of the actual revised’ Palestinian textbooks the Europea, Commission has shared with the members of the European Parliament as evidence of reform. IMPACT-se told the European Jewish Press that ‘’the claims of reform simply are not supported by the material. ‘’Core content promoting hate, violence, antisemitism and the earsure of Israel remains intact, and in mqany cases the changes are merely cosmetic.’’
An this despite the fact that the Palestinian Authority had signed in 2024 a letter of intent with the European Union committing to a process of curriculum reform to align the Palestinian curriculum with UNESCO standards.
On Monday, the Palestine Donor Group is expected to announce a funding ato the PA under the EU’s PEGASE mechanism, which finances the salaries of Palestinian education-sector civil servants responsible for drafting, teaching, disseminating, implementing, and delivering the Palestinian curriculum.
The EU has publicly stated that the PA has “finalized” revisions to the Grade 12 curriculum, made “comprehensive revisions” to Grades 1–4, introduced “substantial changes,” and shown “tangible progress” toward UNESCO standards.
At the request of Members of the European Parliament, who voted last May resolutions calling for the removal of the hate content and for future EU funding for the PA to be conditioned upon this, the EU publicly shared links to the allegedly revised Palestinian textbooks.
EU education-sector funding relates to the salaries of civil servants who draft, teach, disseminate, implement, and deliver the Palestinian curriculum. This curriculum is taught in Palestinian Authority schools, UNRWA schools and Hamas-run schools across the West Bank and Gaza.
IMPACT-se’s comprehensive review identified over 280 instances of content violating UNESCO standards for peace and tolerance across the entire curriculum corpus of the Grade 1-4 and 12 textbooks examined.
What are the main findings of this review ?
Glorification of violence, martyrdom, and terrorism
Across grade levels, the curriculum presents violence, martyrdom, and armed struggle as moral ideals. Grade 1 pupils read a poem opening with “I will sacrifice myself.” Grade 2 students are called to sing “I will give it [my land]my soul” and “water it with my blood.” Grade 4 students are instructed to memorize the line “immortalize the memory of the martyr.”
In Grade 12, Dalal al-Mughrabi, responsible for the 1978 Coastal Road massacre in which 38 Israelis were killed, including 13 children, is praised in a grammar exercise as “a Palestinian martyr.” Another lesson suggests refugees return to Haifa “with a weapon in [their]hand.”
Religion weaponized for national struggle and jihad
Islamic Education textbooks blur the boundary between faith and nationalist conflict. A Grade 1 religious lesson introduces language of self-sacrifice for the homeland. In Grade 12 Islamic Education, Saladin is presented as a model of jihad and linked to the contemporary duty to “liberate Palestine from the Zionist Occupation.”
Mathematics used to reinforce conflict
Math exercises include calculating phone-call durations with imprisoned Palestinians, using maps that present all Israeli territory as Palestine, and classifying contemporary Israeli cities as Palestinian. A Grade 12 math lesson names a fictional financial institution after a PFLP terrorist who died while preparing an explosive device for an attack in Tel Aviv.
Antisemitic content remains present
The curriculum portrays “the Jews” collectively as deceitful, manipulative, treacherous, and hostile toward the prophets. Across multiple subjects, the right of Jewish self-determination is denied.
Peace education replaced by confrontation
The revised curriculum contains virtually no meaningful peace education. References that appeared in pre-2016 editions — including Camp David, Annapolis, Yasser Arafat’s call for a “new era of peace,” and Israel’s peace treaty with Jordan — have been removed and not reinstated. Grades 1–4 National and Social Upbringing textbooks state that one objective is to prepare students to “confront” Israel.
Israel systematically erased and delegitimized
Maps, cities, and landmarks in Israel are consistently presented as Palestinian, with “Palestine” depicted as encompassing the entire territory between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.
Erasure of Jewish historical and religious ties
The revised editions exclude references to the Jewish historical and religious connection to the Land of Israel and Jerusalem, removing content that acknowledged these ties in earlier versions of the curriculum.
According to IMPACT-se, the PA has publicly denied making textbook revisions while simultaneously presenting reforms to donors. The Palestinian Ministry of Education stated that “the textbooks currently used by students in all various governorates have not been revised at all,” dismissing reports of changes as “rumors and false information.” School principals were also instructed to reinstate previously removed Grade 12 lessons “omitted in error,” including a lesson on violent jihad.
Teacher guides, which directly govern classroom instruction, were neither revised nor included in the PA’s reform commitments. These guides provide teachers with explicit instructions on how to deliver the curriculum and have been documented to contain content that goes beyond the textbooks themselves in promoting violence, antisemitism, and hatred.
The EU has already provided €400 million to the Palestinian Authority through the end of 2024 on the basis of this reform process, with curriculum and education reform included as part of that framework.
June 2025 was the last time EU funding to Palestinian Education reform took place when €150 million was disbursed directly to the PA for salaries of education civil servants which include those involved in drafting and teaching the curriculum without any linkage to textbook reform despite previous commitments.