"When you look into the mirror -- what do you see?" A wild stretching of arms and the prompt answer: "I see myself." And again: "When you look into the mirror. . ." An English class with 50 children in a small classroom in a refugee camp. Growing up under incredible conditions: narrow alleyways, no place to play, rubbish everywhere. The experience of Occupation, repression, Israeli control, the constant fear of raids and curfews. No wonder the intifada started here, its first victim a school child. the years of Occupation have marked the children: throwing stones instead of balls, camp 'games' against the armed soldiers, that was childhood. Even today children sign the V of victory and 'hands-up-or-I-shoot' when you take their picture. "Children have skipped childhood here. We treat them as small adults. They are very aggressive, disturbed and easily hurt. Psychological help? There is no money for counselors and teachers cannot deal with these problems. How can they, with 50 children per class?"
The secondary school we visit is even more spartanic. Drilling and authoritarian structures determine methodology. Mathematics exercises till use Egyptian pounds and not the local shekel; there is no money for new and modern teaching materials. The 16 and 17 year old boys, sitting in much too narrow benches, fought the intifada, and many of them are now virtually illiterate. "All the energy they used to put into fighting they now put into education." It sounds enthralling, what the Director of this school tells us, but it is clear that there is so much to catch up with, and many teachers complain of discipline and motivation problems, about drop-outs. A great future is promised to these boys despite the enormous poverty and unemployment, but drilling brings no better qualifications; the hopes of the Director that 30% of 'his' boys will got to universities to build the new Palestine sound rather euphoric.
What has changed about the Gaza schools? The green-white-red flag, the picture of Arafat, the national anthem. The less obvious signs: the return to a normal school day, no more fear for closures and clashes, a sense of reconstruction. Much more will still have to be done. And then there is this new identity. It nearly sounds symbolic that the children in the English class hesitate when they have to use the plural: "When we look into the mirror, what do we see? We see . . . my . . . our . . . ourself. We see ourselves."
Elaine Clark
Educational Network, POB 66, Ramallah, West Bank
tel: 02 995 6230/fax: 02 995 6231 e-mail: eclark@ednet.birzeit.edu