MK Tzvi Sukkot said his recent visits to schools in Israel’s Arab sector, in his role as chair of the Knesset Education Committee, have made him a “star on Arab social media” in recent weeks. Speaking on Radio Galey Yisrael with Ziv Maor and Menachem Man, he said he had launched what he described as a committee tour of education in the Arab sector because “everything starts with education.”
Sukkot argued that the state spends “hundreds of millions of shekels” on Arab education and said that funding should first be checked to ensure it goes to institutions that teach recognition of Israel and oppose crime, violence and terror. He said the committee’s goal is to see where the money is going and whether it is being used appropriately.
His comments came after a planned committee visit about two weeks ago to a school in the town of Tuba-Zangariyye, where the school gates were locked. Although the visit had been coordinated in advance with the Education Ministry and the local authority, as is customary, the council head and other residents prevented the delegation from entering the classrooms.
According to the report, the municipal head told them, “No entry, we are the owners here, the North is ours.” Sukkot responded that “there is no extraterritoriality in Israel,” and said the committee had come to inspect how schools are educating children. He claimed they found education that promotes violence, crime and bullying, and said he would work to stop any budget for schools that, in his words, teach criminal behavior.
