Netanyahu slams attack on school

JERUSALEM: An arson attack targeting Grade 1 classrooms at a Jewish-Arab school on Saturday sparked condemnation yesterday as racial tension in Jerusalem showed little sign of abating.

The attack occurred at the Hand-in-Hand bilingual school, a rare symbol of coexistence in a city fraught with growing friction between Jews and Palestinians.

Scrawled on the walls were offensive slogans in Hebrew reading “Death to Arabs” and “There’s no coexistence with cancer”, police said, describing the attack as a “very serious incident”.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the attack and pledged to act “forcefully” to return “the rule of law”.

Justice Minister Tzipi Livni said there would be a “zero tolerance” approach to anyone behind such acts.

“I will work determinedly against everyone who acts against the law and expresses through violence the racist demon which has emerged in Israeli society,” she said.

Headmistress Nadia Knane said a Grade 1 classroom had been badly damaged by the fire and that the attackers had tried to set another classroom alight.

“After I saw what was written, I realised it was not just a fire. They wrote ‘Death to Arabs’ and ‘Kahana was right’ – words which have a lot of meaning,” she said.

Meir Kahana was a virulently anti-Arab rabbi whose Kach party was banned over incitement to racial hatred but whose ideology inspires loyalty among Jewish extremists.

“The school had been targeted several times in recent months but every other time was outside the school. This is the first time it was inside,” the headmistress said. “The fact that they went into a first grade class is really crossing a red line.”

Outside, scores of people gathered in support of the school and its pupils and teachers.

They carried placards in Hebrew, Arabic and English reading: “Spread the light – together against terror” and “Light in a place of terrorism”.

Hatam Mattar, head of the parents’ committee, denounced it as “a barbaric attack”.

Jerusalem’s deputy mayor Rachel Azaria said the attack was “a horrific crime perpetrated by people who wanted to destroy any place that created real co-operation between Jews and Arabs”. “We will not let them do this.” Education Minister Shai Piron said it was a “violent and despicable incident” and “a serious affront to the fabric of Jewish-Arab relations”.

The school is on the Green Line separating west Jerusalem from the annexed eastern sector.

In the past few years, it has been targeted by so-called price tag hate crimes by suspected Jewish extremists, most recently during Israel’s 50-day war against Hamas militants in July and August. – Sapa-AFP