Approximately 1.53 million students in Palestine face severe challenges that threaten their educational future, warning of the emergence of a generation lacking basic knowledge. This student demographic constitutes nearly a quarter of the population of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, reflecting the magnitude of the societal danger resulting from the disruption of the educational process and its sharp decline in regularity in recent years.
In the Gaza Strip, the ongoing war of extermination since October 2023 has caused a complete halt to the educational process, as the occupation destroyed hundreds of schools and converted the remaining ones into shelters. This reality has deprived approximately 700,000 students of their right to education, leading to the erosion of their basic reading, writing, and arithmetic skills despite their nominal progression to higher grades.
Displaced families in Gaza recount painful stories of their children losing educational skills, with parents indicating that their once-excellent children now suffer from 'disguised illiteracy.' Students who are automatically promoted find a huge gap between their actual level and the imposed curricula, in the absence of books and a suitable learning environment within displacement tents.
The Ministry of Education, in cooperation with international organizations, resorted to establishing 'educational points' inside the tents in an attempt to salvage what could be saved. These points operate on a part-time basis for three days a week, but they do not cover all educational stages, with most being limited to the lower primary level, leaving preparatory and secondary students without options.
Educational supervisors in the shelters confirm a significant spread of illiteracy among young children, with some ten-year-olds unable to hold a pen. Psychological problems and learning difficulties resulting from successive traumas are also prominent, requiring intensive counseling interventions that go beyond merely providing brief academic lessons.
For his part, educational officials in Gaza describe the 'automatic promotion' system as a necessary evil to prevent the complete halt of education for hundreds of thousands of students. The ministry is currently working on two tracks; the first is promotion based on age, and the second is providing remedial materials to try to compensate for the enormous learning loss accumulated over two and a half years.
In the West Bank, the situation does not appear less complex, with 829,000 students suffering from irregular schooling in public schools for two years. The roots of the crisis lie in the financial distress experienced by the Palestinian Authority due to the occupation's piracy of tax revenues, which led to the government's inability to pay teachers' salaries in full.
The financial crisis led to a series of teachers' strikes demanding their rights, followed by decisions to reduce school hours to only three days a week. With the escalation of field events, the ministry shifted to a 'distance learning' system, which exacerbated the educational dilemma that had not yet recovered from the consequences of the previous COVID-19 pandemic.
Families in the West Bank complain about the heavy burden placed on them in following online classes, especially with the curricula being shortened to limited 'educational packages.' For example, the Arabic language curriculum for some basic grades was reduced from 15 lessons to only 6 lessons, which seriously weakens students' academic achievement.
Data from the Palestinian Educational Coalition indicates that the actual school days in public schools in the West Bank did not exceed 50 days during the first semester. This repeated disruption has created a state of 'educational alienation' among students, where students lose the basic concepts that the curriculum was designed to build upon in later stages.
This bitter reality has pushed some affluent families to seek costly alternatives such as private schools or private lessons and educational centers. In contrast, the vast majority of students remain dependent on struggling public schools, deepening the class and educational gap within Palestinian society.
The Undersecretary of the Ministry of Education acknowledges a significant learning loss but links the solution to the necessity of finding a way out of the government's financial crisis to secure teachers' rights. The ministry confirms that current measures such as teaching summaries and the assignment system are merely palliatives to mitigate the impact and not radical solutions to the structural crisis.
Civil society organizations and parent councils propose initiatives to seek additional resources to support teachers and ensure regular attendance, but they have not found their way to actual implementation. Experts warn that the continuation of this confusion will lead to a decline in the quality of Palestinian education, which was historically known for its excellence and strength despite the conditions of occupation.
Saving the educational process in Palestine requires urgent international and local efforts to support the dilapidated infrastructure and protect children's right to learn. Without a comprehensive national plan to compensate for learning loss, an entire generation remains threatened with ignorance and the loss of the cognitive tools necessary to build the desired Palestinian state in the future.
My children have become semi-illiterate; they have forgotten how to read, write, and the multiplication table, and almost everything else due to the long interruption from schooling.
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Education Crisis in Palestine: One and a Half Million Students Face Illiteracy and a Lost Future