Education Under Occupation: East Jerusalem
An interview with Zakaria Odeh This interview, by Jody Sokolower, first appeared in Rethinking Schools magazine, spring 2016. When Israel declared itself a state in 1948, it forcibly ejected 750,000 Palestinians, who became refugees. The West Bank, including East Jerusalem, ended up under Jordanian control; Gaza under Egyptian control. Almost 20 years later, as a result of the June 1967 war, all those areas were conquered by Israel. Israel occupied the West Bank and Gaza, but it annexed East Jerusalem—in the face of universal opposition from the international community and in defiance of international law. Palestinian residents of Jerusalem were issued special Jerusalem ID cards, which identify them as “permanent residents.” Now the…