Jihadi textbooks in schools funded by £100m of OUR cash
Outrage over foreign aid ‘fuelling hate’ in Palestine
MINISTERS pledged urgent action last night after it emerged that British foreign aid cash is funding schools where textbooks on martyrdom and radical Islamism are used.
The Daily Mail has discovered that tens of millions of pounds of UK foreign aid is helping fund schools in Gaza and the West Bank that use such material in lessons.
The money goes via a UN agency that some other nations have chosen to stop financing because of concerns.
The textbooks include a reading exercise for six year olds with the words ‘martyr’ and ‘attack’, plus poems for eight-year-olds which include phrases such as ‘sacrifice my blood’ to ‘eliminate the usurper from my country’ and ‘annihilate the remnants of the foreigners’.
Nine year olds learn maths by adding the number of martyrs in Palestinian uprisings in textbooks illustrated with pictures of their funerals.
And ten year olds learn the most important thing is giving their life for ‘sacrifice, fight, jihad, and struggle’. Newton’s Second Law is taught to 11 year olds through the image of a boy with a slingshot targeting Israeli soldiers.
The schools are attended by 325,000 pupils, up to age 16.
The Mail has also learned that teachers who work at them have called for Jews to be murdered, abused them as ‘pigs and apes’ and praised Adolf Hitler.
And the schools are said to be ‘fertile grounds’ for terrorist groups to recruit with scores of suicide bombers and jihadi leaders among past pupils.
The British aid money goes via the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA). During the past five years, the UK has given £330million and pledged another £65million for this year.
Although the UN agency’s work also includes healthcare, relief and social services, most of the funding it receives – 58 per cent – goes on education.
Of that money, about 62 per cent is for schools in West Bank and Gaza – which means about £120millon of UK funding has gone where the textbooks are used. UNRWA insists these schools have to follow a curriculum set by the Palestinian Authority, which produces and pays for the textbooks.
However, the Department for International Development, which hands out foreign aid, last night said the UK had lobbied for a thorough independent review of the material, which was now being led by the EU.
Newly appointed International Development Secretary AnneMarie Trevelyan also promised to take up the issue ‘urgently’ with the Palestinian authorities.
‘The UK Government has a zero tolerance approach towards incitement to violence,’ a spokesman for Dfid said.
‘The UK lobbied for a thorough independent review of textbooks used in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, which is now under way.
‘The new International Development Secretary will urgently press the Palestinian Education Minister to take swift action on what it recommends.’
Britain is now the fourth largest contributor to UNRWA.
But the US and other European countries have frozen aid over how the agency is run. Other content from the textbooks include glorified images of terrorists such as Dalal alMughrabi, who led the 1978 ‘ Coastal Road Massacre’ in which 38 Israelis including 13 children were murdered – along with the slogan ‘Hooray for the heroes and... down with the cowards!’.
Other material praises children who were martyred while fighting ‘Zionist enemies’. In history, pupils learn that the PLO 1973 hijacking of Pan Am and Lufthansa planes that killed 32 passengers were ‘operations against Zionist targets’.
A new report from the Henry Jackson Society, a British foreign policy think-tank, entitled Reconsidering the Future of UNRWA, alleges the agency ‘spreads extremist propaganda, and is infiltrated by extremists.’
The report adds: ‘Its educational initiatives, both formal and informal, are full of antiIsraeli and anti-Semitic incitement, and UNRWA helps nurture a culture of violence towards Israelis through its educational activities.’
Marcus Sheff, of Israeli-based Impact-se, an organisation that monitors school textbooks, said: ‘British taxpayers are paying for UNRWA to support the radicalisation of over 300,000 children every single school day.’
And former Tory party chairman Lord Pickles described the agency as a ‘significant road block to peace’.
UNRWA claims to review troubling material – but when it tried to act in 2017 it was forced to back down after the Palestinian Authority suspended ties.
An UNRWA spokesman said last night: ‘UNRWA cannot alter host government curriculum as this is a matter of national sovereignty, but it does have robust systems in place to ensure education delivered in its schools reflects UN values.
‘All UNRWA students receive human rights, conflict resolution and tolerance education.’
‘Annihilate foreigners’ ‘Spreading extremism’
Betrayals. Plots. Friendships up in smoke. And why it took the Camerons’ 12-year-old daughter to announce defeat... in the first part of a brilliantly vivid and intimate new memoir, the ex-PM’s right-hand woman tells the inside story of a political earthquake
FOR more than a decade Kate Fall was at the heart of David Cameron’s administration. As his deputy chief of staff she was his gatekeeper, the person who sat outside his office and decided who came in and who didn’t. Now she has written the riveting inside story of her years in the nerve-centre of power — serialised exclusively in the Daily Mail. It begins with a compelling account of how, despite a majority and every expectation of another three years as Prime Minister, a devastated David Cameron watched all he’d worked for fall apart. He never recovered from what he felt was an unforgiveable betrayal as some of his closest friends and political allies abandoned him on the issue of Europe.
JUNE 23, 2016. Referendum day. After a late dinner at No 10, we have gathered round the television in the Thatcher study, the sword of Damocles hanging.
On the ten o’clock news, pollsters are predicting defeat for Leave by 48 to 52. By 11pm, Nigel Farage seems to have conceded. The relief in the room is palpable. The pound rallies.
But we are wary. The results are not due in for another few hours. I can’t take another one of these results nights, Samantha says to me. I agree. ‘This will be our last one. David isn’t going to stand again, remember.’
David and Samantha’s 12-year-old daughter Nancy, who has insisted on staying up, is perched between David and me at the table. George [Osborne] is on the other side. We have set up the computer on the table, which breaks down the results we need to get, area by area.
Newcastle upon Tyne declares first — a win for us, but not a big one, making us slightly nervous. This is followed by a decisive victory for Leave in Sunderland (61 per cent to 39 per cent).
More results start trickling through. Most just miss the mark for a Remain win. It is beginning to look like a trend.
Nancy is marking them off. ‘ Another bad result, Dad,’ she says. And another. Morale plummets. ‘Dad, we’re losing,’ says Nancy.
HOW did it come to this? This was not the way we — or indeed most people — thought the referendum would go.
Just a year earlier we had won an unexpected outright victory in the General Election with a Conservative majority.
After five years of Coalition government with the Liberal Democrats, this is a welcome and radical change. We feel in step with the country.
Political liberty is ours and the issue of Europe is set to be resolved once and for all. David hopes to have his closest and most talented allies with him — until February 2016, when Michael Gove announced — despite previous indications to the contrary — that he had decided to back leaving Europe.
MICHAEL’S decision has come as a massive blow to the Prime Minister — both personally and professionally. But the Leave campaign still lacks a leader with wider popular appeal.
That’s why they’re so keen to land Boris Johnson.
Fortunately, he’s more in our camp than theirs. He’s been a critic of the EU, but also a strong European. The grit in the oyster — but very much at home in the oyster.
His family, to whom he’s very close, are passionately proEuropean. His father, Stanley, was an MEP; his sisters and brothers are mostly proEurope and pro-immigration.
Above all, his regular text exchanges with David Cameron are reassuring . . . until suddenly they are less so.
Coming into decision time, Boris seems to be revolving like a hotel-lobby door.
We’re aware that he’s been talking to Michael — and then a picture comes out of the Goves and the Johnsons having dinner together.
The truth is that Boris is weighing up his beliefs on Europe and his desire to lead the party, trying to calculate how they come together to best promote his interests.
Of one thing I’m certain: he’s convinced that, had he been PM, he’d have delivered a better European deal for Britain than David has. And, at heart, I believe Boris is more for staying and pushing for reform in Europe than for leaving.
It’s the leadership issue that complicates matters for him. Less than a year ago, he was poised to take his chance at the leadership after the 2015 election. So he was sorely disappointed by David’s unexpected victory.
A bruised Boris was subsequently banished into exile, and teased by his adversary, George Osborne, who was being hailed as the coming man.
Yet now, of course, Boris has a unique chance to rebalance the scales in his favour. And it’s just too tempting. Opting for Leave looks like a win–win for him. If Leave win, and David resigns, Boris is the hero of the day. And if they lose then he’s still the hero of the day to the party whose membership is 80 per cent for Leave.
This will give him the advantage over George. And he won’t have the added problem of needing to sort out Brexit.
In fact, we often wonder if this wasn’t Boris’s preferred outcome — for us to win the referendum and him to win the leadership.
And there’s another factor. Soon after winning the 2015 election, David revealed that
he wouldn’t be standing again. Had he never said that, Boris might have had more incentive to row in behind him. the thought of five more years and possibly a third election under David — with Boris exiled to the wilderness — might just have swung the balance.
in the end, Boris tells us he plans to make his decision in time for the publication of his regular Monday column in the telegraph. He starts writing one version for Remain, another for leave. He and David are in touch throughout. And then — bleep — Sunday afternoon, the news hits our phones. Boris is gone.
Boris’s decision is a huge professional blow for David. But it’s not the personal one that Michael’s was. Because while Boris was always a friend, Michael was a very close one.
We try to persuade the Prime Minister that Michael has to be left to follow his beliefs, but David can’t damp down a very deep sense of personal betrayal.
Over the decade that he’s led the party, he’s been supported by — and supportive to — a few close friends he trusts and respects. And they’ve risen with him.
Yes, they may have done well enough with someone else, but they happen to have done well with him. No one else — other than George Osborne — could have landed David such a blow.
Perhaps it’s naive of him to think that Michael, who’s always been anti-Eu, would be prepared to sacrifice his political beliefs for personal loyalty. But then David believed Michael had committed, in private, to just that.
the sense of betrayal intensifies over the weeks that follow.
Mutual friends whisper in David’s ear that this is a well thoughtthrough act of revenge. that the Goves have never forgiven him for what happened in 2014, when he moved Michael from Education to become Chief Whip — even though Michael had at first very much wanted the job.
that all the dinners, weekends, and shared school runs since then have meant nothing. that they’ve been like a brood of cuckoos in the Cameron family nest.
this is very unhelpful for everyone. i try as much as possible to shut the chatter down.
But Michael’s departure is also a big professional headache for us. He gives the leave campaign huge intellectual credibility and a vocal leadership; he’s a powerful persuader. Michael Gove tells George that he’s supporting leave because he can’t go against his own beliefs, but plans to be as passive as possible during the campaign. this way, he’ll protect his integrity and his personal loyalties.
But this is not actually what happens. in fact, Michael is put in charge of the leave campaign.
At a drinks party a few weeks later, out of the corner of my eye i see his wife [Daily Mail columnist] Sarah Vine making her way towards me. She suggests we go outside to have a chat. i brace myself. Sarah is always so compelling.
Even if you profoundly disagree with her, she has a way of wrapping her narrative round you, until the way of least resistance (her way) seems the only sensible option.
She says that David and Samantha are not acting like grown-ups. this is not personal; it’s politics. let’s put all the hurt to one side, she says, and have a huge argument and make up over dinner.
She wants me to broker this rapprochement, of course. i promise that i’ll talk to the Camerons.
Which i do. Only my efforts are made futile by the Sunday papers, which carry an open letter from Michael to David, saying he’s undermining public trust in politicians.
it’s a deeply personal attack — the sort we would have thought twice about before deploying it against even an opposition party leader. David is furious and still more hurt.
WHERE does theresa May stand in all this?
David asks her, politely, as they eye each other up from opposite sides of the No 10 den. She sits very still and straight, allowing the question mark to hang awkwardly in the air, with no apparent embarrassment.
it seems she hasn’t made up her mind yet. this goes on for weeks. When finally she opts for Remain, it’s because she believes it’s marginally the better option.
However, we can’t get her to engage with the campaign, save making one speech in which she takes great care to spell out that she thinks both sides have a point. interesting that on the most pressing issue of our time, theresa
seems to have no particularly strong view, either way.
She chooses instead to sit out the campaign on the fence — which turns out to be a brilliant strategic move — while George, the so-called ruthless strategist, commits political hara-kiri for his beliefs.
The referendum looms over us. Less than a year after the General election, we find ourselves preparing for yet another seminal poll.
There’s a sense of fatigue. A sense that, less than a year ago, we all put our lives on hold to go out and convince the British people that our vision for the country was the right one, and that we haven’t had the time to recover or rebuild.
The American media strategist Bill Knapp, who helped Obama into office in 2008, flies over to start preparing David for TV interviews. At the end of a long day, Bill takes me aside.
‘I gotta be honest with you,’ he says. ‘You’re never going to win this one unless you have an emotional argument for Remain. And you’ve gotta have a better answer on immigration.’
Of course, Bill has zoomed in straight away on our two core problems — problems we never resolve.
It’s true our message isn’t a very emotive one. No one is pretending the eU is a perfect institution. Quite the opposite. We’ve spent years arguing for reform. Securing our special status.
essentially, we’re stuck arguing for a marriage we’ve just taken to mediation. Saying: ‘It’s about more than just the relationship; it’s about the kids — and their kids. The house, the car, the holidays, our social life. About our lifestyle.’
But still, at the core, we’re having to mount an argument for what appears to be a soured relationship – and this is hard.
All the emotional energy is with the other side, the side that chants for liberty, freedom, a fresh start.
And everywhere we look, people are staring at their feet. Labour are nowhere to be seen. Business just wants it all to be over.
There are lots of people who want us to win — but few who want to help us.
We watch the huge gathering at Wembley — Ruth Davidson and Amber Rudd on our side against Boris and Labour’s Gisela Stuart on the other. In footage of the ‘spin’ room — where both sides are briefing journalists — we catch the sight of a familiar bald head bobbing up and down.
It’s David’s old friend and adviser Steve hilton. Doesn’t Steve live in California? What’s he doing there?
The last time we saw him, a few months ago, was when he came to england to launch a book. he’d told us then that he didn’t intend to get drawn into the referendum campaign.
Obviously he’s changed his mind. A few weeks after Wembley, he returns to campaign for Leave, making a number of highprofile interventions.
For David, a picture taken of Steve and Boris in front of the Vote Leave bus symbolises another friendship strained by a sense of betrayal.
In some ways, this seems even more personal: Steve, not being an elected politician, was under no pressure to throw himself into the campaign.
Maybe we simply hadn’t understood that, above all, he wanted some limelight for himself.
There are moments in politics when some grow tired of the backroom and want to be number one. Older, wiser people have warned that political friendships don’t last. I thought: you just don’t understand these ones. They’re different. And some were.
But I see now the truth in their words. Perhaps there were just too many conflicting priorities. Of loyalty and belief. Of ambition and friendship.
ON POLLING day, the weather takes a turn for the worse. It feels judgmental in its fury, this rain pouring down.
Many commuters in the South miss their trains home. We are anxious it will keep them from voting.
In the Thatcher study at No 10 where we sit glued to the results, David is tense but maintaining total calm.
Finally, defeated by exhaustion, Nancy slips in to her sleeping bag, which she has positioned under the table. But she can’t sleep without her childhood cuddly toy, which is duly fetched from upstairs.
There is some good news from Wandsworth. But some more very bad. Sheffield has voted to leave by 51 per cent. We sit exhausted and shell- shocked, watching the results like a slowmotion car crash.
Nothing is coming to stem the tide. There is an agonised hush in the room. We all know it is lost, that it has slipped from our hands, but no one wants to say it out loud — at least not just yet.
Around three in the morning David suggests a small council of war. George, ed [Llewellyn, chief of staff], and I follow him down the stairs, past the pictures of past prime ministers, into his den. ‘ It’s over,’ says David. ‘ We’ve lost. I’ll stand down first thing.’
IT’S LIKe there’s been a political tsunami, changing the landscape overnight. Boris and Michael emerge to launch their campaign for what’s effectively joint leadership of the party. There’s real momentum around the duo.
Sarah Vine writes in her weekly Daily Mail column: ‘ Given
Creative differences: Steve Hilton and Cameron
Michael’s high-profile role in the Leave campaign, that means he — we — are now charged with implementing the instructions of 17 million people. And that is an awesome responsibility.’
She’s certainly right. But it’s the use of the world ‘we’ which attracts most attention — ‘we’ meaning presumably herself and her husband, Michael.
Amid the pain of defeat, the personal disloyalty of a broken friendship weighs heavily in the flat upstairs.
The idea of Michael running No 10 alongside Boris disturbs David. The aforementioned ‘we’ have wielded the knife, leaving blood fresh on the carpet — and now seem to be busy measuring up the curtains.
however, the prospect of a Boris premiership is not straightforward either. We remain suspicious of his motives. To win the crown fighting for a cause he may not have entirely believed in seems the ultimate false victory.
David really wants Theresa May to win. She certainly needs all the help she can get to rally the MPs round her: they haven’t greatly warmed to her over the years.
I’M IN a car with George Osborne, the day before the list of candidates for the Tory leadership closes.
George says it’s possible Michael Gove will decide at the last minute to stand on his own. Michael’s allies are egging him on. To be his own man.
The next morning the news breaks: Michael is to stand on his own. Yelps from the Downing Street den.
Later that morning, Boris announces he’ll pull out of the race. Michael’s support is whittled away and he falls out of the second ballot.
Now the two politicians who won the campaign for Britain to leave the european Union have devoured each other in political acrimony, just at the time when they should have risen to the occasion to do their best for the 17 million voters who put their trust in them.
It saddens me that Michael, whose political credibility was built up around intellect, loyalty, and decency, became an archassassin. It was a role that never suited him, and still doesn’t.
his head was turned by petty political games. Not just blowing up a few good men, but himself in the process. At least for a while.
Theresa is declared leader of the Conservatives and Prime Minister in waiting. David offers fulsome congratulations.
Only weeks ago, we’d been imagining three more years in Downing Street; now we have three days.
ADAPTED from The Gatekeeper by Kate Fall, published by HQ at £16.99 © Kate Fall 2020. To order a copy for £13.60 (20 per cent discount, offer valid to 7/3/2020; P&P free), visit mailshop.co.uk or call 01603 648155.