The head of the schools of the Franciscan province in the Holy Land warned that a new Israeli law threatens the existence of Christian schools in Jerusalem.
The new law, approved by the Knesset (parliament), “prevents graduates of universities that follow the curriculum of the State of Palestine from teaching in schools in Israel, unless they also possess a specific accreditation from the Israeli authorities,” the Vatican newspaper reported.
Father Ibrahim Faltas, OFM, of the Custody of the Holy Land, said that “all Palestinians from the West Bank who studied at Palestinian universities, such as the one in Bethlehem, which is Christian, or Hebron, will no longer be able to teach in schools in Israel: this is truly very serious.”
The 15 Christian schools in Jerusalem, with 12,000 students, “are the ones that will primarily bear the consequences of this decision,” Father Faltas added. “There are many teachers who come from the West Bank and especially from the Bethlehem area: as many as 235. It would mean closing all these schools because there are no teachers in Jerusalem, they cannot be found.”