A study of 22 world history and social studies textbooks, used in public high schools and private secondary schools in Philadelphia, shows that “the majority” of the books “fail to give adequate historical facts about Nazi racialism and genocide,” The Jewish Exponent reports.
The Philadelphia Commission on Human Relations called for a re-examination of history texts last winter, after 52 anti-Semitic incidents had taken place in Philadelphia, as part of the worldwide wave of swastika-smearings that followed the daubing of the synagogue in Cologne, Germany, last Christmas Eve. Such a re-examination is now being carried out by the Philadelphia City Board of Education. The Commission itself has named a committee to contact private and parochial schools with requests for re-evaluation of history textbooks.
One textbook cited by the Exponent has this to say about the mass murder of Jews under the Nazi regime: “Thousands of Jews, including old people and small children, were herded into prison camps. Many died there. ” The writer raises the question whether such a statement “could give a youngster a true idea of the dangers of Nazi racialism.”
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