PA President Mahmoud Abbas. Photo: World Economic Forum.

JNS.org – The Chairman of the Jerusalem Teachers’ Association has said that the educational message in Arab schools in Jerusalem is that all of Israel is occupied and must be returned to the Palestinians.

“In our schools, we teach what our religion and conscience dictate: That Jerusalem is Arab and that Palestine – from north to south, from the [Jordan] River to the [Mediterranean] Sea – is Islamic Palestinian Arab, and will remain so in spite of the damned occupier,” Issa Salman said on Palestinian Authority (PA) television, Palestinian Media Watch reported.

Public Arab schools in Jerusalem fall under under the authority of the Education Administration of Jerusalem, which belongs the Jerusalem Municipality and the Israeli Ministry of Education.

However, Salman’s argument echoes an October statement by PA President Mahmoud Abbas’ advisor on religious affairs, Mahmoud Al-Habbash, who said that “that according to Islamic Shari’ah law, the entire land of Palestine is waqf (i.e., an inalienable religious endowment in Islamic law) and is blessed land, and that it is prohibited to sell, bestow ownership or facilitate the occupation of even a millimeter of it.”