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UAE schools will now teach Holocaust in national curriculum
January 09, 2023
More than two years following the signing of the Abraham Accords, the UAE confirms that it will include the Holocaust in the curriculum of its primary and secondary schools.
The United Arab Emirates will now include the Holocaust in the national curriculum at the primary and secondary level, following the signing of the Abraham Accords, the normalization deal between the UAE and Israel 2020.
The UAE embassy in Washington confirmed in a tweet that the Holocaust will be added to the primary and secondary schools' curricula. "In the wake of the historic #AbrahamAccords, [the UAE] will now include the Holocaust in the curriculum for primary and secondary schools," the tweet read.
US special envoy to combat antisemitism Deborah Lipstadt praised the UAE's decision.
“Holocaust education is an imperative for humanity and too many countries, for too long, continue to downplay the Shoah [Holocaust in Hebrew] for political reasons..I commend the UAE for this step and expect others to follow suit soon," she tweeted.
According to media reports, the Emirati Ministry of Education is currently working on the new curricula in coordination with the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education. The topic was never covered at schools in the UAE before. The Arab world is rife with conspiracy theories, anti-semitic publications and denials about the systemic killing of six million Jews in Nazi Germany in World War II.
Ali Al Nuaimi, member of the Federal National Council and a broker of the Abraham Accords, said during a Washington Institute panel discussion in Washington last November that the Holocaust is not just a Jewish tragedy, but a human one that should be told.
“Public figures failed to speak the truth because a political agenda hijacked their narrative, yet a tragedy on the scale of the Holocaust targets not only Jews but humanity as a whole. Therefore, public figures and scholars should be encouraged to discuss the Holocaust and protect common human values while leaving political differences aside,” he said.
Last September, UAE's foreign minister Abdullah bin Zayed became the first senior Arab official to pay respects at Yad Vashem, Israel’s Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem.