OTTAWA – Hasbara Fellowships Canada is demanding that the Province of Ontario immediately remove a biased student video that has resurfaced at an Ottawa high school.
The video sparked an outcry earlier this year when parents complained it was “propaganda,” prompting Ontario Minister of Education Stephen Lecce to remove it from the Ontario e-Learning course.
The York Region District School Board (YRDSB) also released a statement regretting that the video presented “a biased point of view” and that it was being “removed from resources available to school boards.”
However, this week a distraught parent alerted Hasbara Canada that her child was assigned to watch the misleading video and respond to it as part of their Grade 10 Civics course. Hasbara immediately reached out to MPP Gila Martow, who was very active on this file earlier this year and has alerted Minister Lecce.
“It is imperative that the province ensure that each and every student exposed to this grossly one-sided video be presented with a balanced and informed perspective,” said Daniel Koren, Executive Director of Hasbara Canada. “We have dozens of Hasbara high school interns who would be happy to explain why this video is flawed, historically inaccurate, and most importantly, dangerous.”
In the video, a young boy named “Naj” falsely accuses Israel of “occupying Palestinian land” and using “violence and destructive tactics to continue their occupation.”
“The Gaza militants have retaliated by firing rockets at Israel,” Naj says. “This conflict continues to rage on because the Israelis live as occupiers while the Palestinians live under occupation.”
Hasbara Canada will continue to monitor the situation until the video in question is officially removed from the Ontario high school curriculum.
