A Belgian student and his father were shocked to learn that an anti-Semitic cartoon was being used as an educational tool.
By: United with Israel Staff
Anti-Israel and anti-Semitic content is being used to educate school kids in Belgium about “Water as a weapon” in the framework of geography lessons.
Joodsactueel.be, a Jewish-Belgian news publication, published a report of one such anti-Israeli cartoon used in class.
The cartoon consists of an anti-Semitic stereotype– a fat, religious Jew–enjoying supposedly “Palestinian” water while, while a sympathetically portrayed Palestinian’s pipes run dry.
The cartoon was drawn by Carlos Latuff, an infamous anti-Israel propagandist. Latuff has been accused of anti-Semitism by the Simon Wiesenthal Center and other organizations for his cartoons comparing Israelis to the Nazis.
Latuff was the the second runner-up in the 2006 Holocaust cartoon contest in Iran, which mocked the Holocaust while promoting anti-Semitism.
A photo of the cartoon was taken and sent to joodsactueel.be by the father of a 15-year-old attending the Flemish school.
“I am shocked by such an anti-Semitic cartoon that comes straight from [Nazi leader] Joseph Goebbels’ propaganda book,” the father told Joodsactueel.be.
Belgian Politician André Gantman called the drawing “anti-Semitism of the purest kind.”
The cartoon was found in the “Polaris GO3″ book published by Mechelse Plantyn, a company producing texts for thousands of Flemish students in Belgium.
“It is an outrage that young people are learning about the most complicated conflict in the world in such an insensitive way,” the World Jewish Congress stated.
“When teaching about the Israeli-Palestinian situation, schools should make sure that children have the information that they need to understand both sides of the conflict,” the WJC added.
Mechelse Plantyn has stated it will take the cartoon out of future edition of the text book.
Michael Freilich, editor in chief of Joodsactueel.be wrote that the “ball is now in the camp of the education inspectorate, which must draw the correct conclusion from this on the provision of such material by third parties.”