A state of controversy dominated the Egyptian parliament during the recent period after calls from a parliamentarian to remove parts from Arabic story “Oh Islam” taught to students of Egypt’s Secondary School, as they incite terrorism.
The Egyptian parliamentarian Mona Mounir raised a number of the story’s texts during a parliamentary session, stressing that such texts incite terrorism and affect the students’ way of thinking. She warned that the curricula could turn them to violence in the future.
The Egyptian parliamentarian said, in an interview with “Arabs Today”, that she has not targeted an Islamic story telling historic events, while a literary story existed in the curriculum of Arabic language. She stressed that she does not care of the increasing criticism against her, saying that she gives the priority to developing the education to serve the interests of the country.
Regarding to the position of Education Ministry from her calls, she said that they expressed understanding to her requests and promised to remove any texts inciting terrorism or violence. She added, “We live currently in the age of information technology. How can we teach stories talking about swords to our students?”
She denied what was published over her formal request to the parliamentary education committee to remove the texts, saying that they committee welcomed her calls and expressed enthusiasm to cleanse the curricula.
She stressed the need for educating the children how to respect the Armed Forces and police due to their important role to protect the country, not to promote the ideas supporting the murder and violence. She blamed the existence of such texts for the current attacks targeting the security forces and army men in Sinai and other areas in the country.