With no BBC correspondent currently on the ground in the Gaza Strip and the Palestinian Authority controlled areas of Judea and Samaria, news from those regions has been rather sparse lately. On the other hand, readers can decide for themselves whether any of the following recent stories would have been reported by the BBC Jerusalem Bureau even if it had its full complement of staff.
The Catholic Herald reports that five Christian schools in the Gaza Strip face closure due to the ban on mixed education brought in by Hamas earlier this year.
“Fr Faysal Hijazin said: “This will be a big problem. We hope they will not go through with it, but if they do, we will be in big trouble. We don’t have the space and we don’t have the money to divide our schools.”
In addition to finding additional space, he said, the schools face having to hire more teachers. Men and women teachers would not be allowed to teach classes of the opposite sex older than 10 under Islamic law. […]
Fr Hijazin said that although the order did not specifically single out the Christian schools, the five are the only schools with mixed enrolment in Gaza.
“It is a concern that in education things are getting more conservative,” he said. “It reflects the whole society. This is of concern to both Christians and moderate Muslims. It is not easy to be there.” “
Meanwhile in Ramallah, the Islamist movement Hizb ut Tahrir staged a rally this week to mark the 92nd anniversary of the fall of the Caliphate.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=yP6Kjnx7uDo]
In contrast to previous Hizb ut Tahrir rallies, this one was given free rein by the Palestinian Authority and Khaled Abu Toameh gives some insight into why its approach is different this time.
“Chanting slogans in favor of the restoration of the Caliphate, the Muslim fundamentalists called on Islamic armies to “march toward Palestine to liberate the Aqsa Mosque and the rest of Palestine.”
The fundamentalists also shouted slogans in support of the jihadi terrorists engaged in the fight against Syrian President Bashar Assad’s regime.
Baher Saleh, a senior Hizb-ut-Tahrir official, told the crowd that it was time for Muslim armies to “liberate the Aqsa Mosque from the hands of the filthy Jews.”
Saleh and other members of the organization also condemned the Palestinian Authority leadership for failing to endorse their ideology and mobilize the Islamic world for war against Israel.”
As for the Palestinian Authority, this week the PLO’s Negotiations Affairs Department – headed by Saeb Erekat – launched a new campaign according to which the Latrun Valley, which lies on the main Highway 1 route connecting Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, is “an integral part of Palestine”.
It will be interesting to see if this latest spoke in the wheels of negotiations will merit inclusion in the BBC narrative regarding the peace process.