Review of UNRWA Schools Headed by Hamas Principals

"Main Findings

This report presents an updated review of educational activities organized by UNRWA schools in Gaza, whose administrative officials were recently identified as Hamas military operatives. This link to Hamas is based on new intelligence collected by Israel since October 7th, which identified twelve UNRWA employees in the Gaza Strip holding senior positions (schools principals, deputies, directors and deputy directors of training centers) as members of Hamas or the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.1 The intelligence shows that over 10% of the 510 employees in UNRWA's education system in the Gaza Strip, who hold senior positions, are members of Hamas or the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, both of which are designated terror organizations. Two of the Hamas-member UNRWA employees were principals of schools under which Hamas tunnels were built, as revealed by UNRWA itself: Al-Maghazi Boys Preparatory School B, and Al-Zaytun Boys Preparatory School A. The document contains examples from these schools, originally published in our previous March 2023 report,2 and new examples from other schools based on an initial review of their material.

Our March 2023 report found that these two schools, among many other UNRWA schools, promote violence and terrorism in self-created study material as well as in classrooms. The report found that Al-Maghazi school produced material glorifying violence and terrorism, such as a text describing a firebomb attack on a bus carrying Israelis as a "barbecue party." The report also showed that terrorists such as Dalal Al-Mughrabi, who committed the 1978 Coastal Road Massacre, are glorified as heroes in the classrooms of Al-Zaytun Boys Elementary Schools A, an UNRWA school located in the same complex as the Al-Zaytun Preparatory School. UNRWA repeatedly claims that it does not teach content praising Mughrabi, yet these examples are clear evidence to the contrary.3 The material regarding these schools was presented to a UN internal review group on UNRWA neutrality, headed by the UN’s own Under-Secretary General and former French Foreign Minister, Catherine Colonna. The presentation was part of an extensive dossier on the teaching of hate and antisemitism in UNRWA educational materials and institutions, yet no resulting action was taken.

Furthermore, this report exposes new material prepared by and taught in three schools, whose principals were identified as Hamas operatives: Mahmoud Ahmad Hamdan from Ahmad Abdel Aziz Boys Preparatory School; (Hamdan, contravening UNICEF standards, promoted the ‘Great March of Return’ on his Facebook page, see p.39.) Raed Khaled Abu Mukhadda from Al-Mughraqa Boys Elementary School, and Mahmoud Faez Sarraj from Nuseirat Boys Preparatory C School. Educational content prepared and adopted by these schools promotes libels against and non-recognition of Israel, and gratuitously inserts content promoting hatred and violence against Israel into grammar exercises."