San Diego Adopts Arab-American's Textbook

By Andrea Lorenz

Professor Mounir Farah's textbook, World History: The Human Experience, published by Glencoe, was selected this spring for adoption by the San Diego Unified School District. The teachers who used the book along with two others during a year-long review process chose The Human Experience despite attempts by the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith to influence them to select a competing title. Details of the controversy were presented in the July 1992 issue of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.

University Educators Find Middle East Visits Eye-Opening

American university educators might be expected to return with ambivalent feelings from personal visits to the Middle East, a region whose troubles are recounted daily in major U.S. newspapers. However, one group of educators invited to Israel and another invited to two Arab states of the Gulf, could hardly have been more enthusiastic about their experiences. Seven presidents of historically Black colleges spent eight days in Israel at the invitation of B'nai B'rith and the government of Israel. A 13-member group of professors from colleges in Indiana and Ohio visited Oman and the United Arab Emirates in a study visit organized through the Joseph J. Malone Faculty Fellows Program of the National Council on U. S.-Arab Relations.

The Malone Fellows, who had had little or no prior exposure to the Middle East, were impressed by the modern cities they saw in the United Arab Emirates and Oman. Clifford Staten, professor of political science at Indiana University Southeast, commented, "In 20 years they've made unbelievable progress. Twenty years ago the UAE was desert with hardly any roads. Now it looks like downtown San Diego!" Larry Thornton, professor of history at Hanover College in Hanover, Indiana, was struck by how much effort went into irrigating the country.

Oman, Thornton said, "has a kind of innocence because there is so little international traffic." Prof. Anna Bellisari, who teaches sociology at Wright State University, said she was impressed by Omani efforts to preserve the country's environment. Oman, she said, is the first Gulf country to protect the endangered falcon.

A major misconception dispelled by the visit concerned the level and quality of education available to all citizens of the Gulf countries. Professor Staten concluded that "education is the centerpiece" of the UAE's national development program. During a visit to the UAE National University, the American professors were surprised to learn that women students outnumber men. "They are encouraging women to get an education," Staten said. "We met many educated women who hold high positions in the government."

Professor Bellisari said that Dr. Thuwayba Al-Barwani, assistant dean at Sultan Qaboos University and the highest ranking woman in Oman's educational administration, was one of the two most impressive Omanis she met.

A second misconception that was dispelled, said Professor Staten, was the tendency among Americans who have never visited the Middle East to think of Islam as monolithic. The professors found instead that Islam as practiced in Oman and in the UAE differed from that practiced in Iran. They were impressed by the tolerant attitudes of the Muslims they met. They learned also that women in Oman and the UAE have the choice of whether or not to wear the veil.

Professor Bellisari returned to the U.S. feeling the need to counter efforts in the American media to demonize Islam. She said the group saw no signs of religious extremism in the UAE and Oman.

In a meeting with Dr. Ezzeddin Ibrahim, religious adviser to Abu Dhabi's ruler, Sheikh Zayed, the professors asked, "What message would you like us to take back to America?" Comparing the three monotheistic religions to points on a circle, Dr. Ibrahim answered that he would like Americans to remember that Islam is a continuation of the Judeo-Christian ethic, and that many commonalities link the three religions.

The college presidents who visited Israel returned equally convinced of the educational value of actually "being there." The purpose of their trip was to "expose leading Black intellectuals to some of the concerns being dealt with by Israelis and to develop working relationships between the Israeli universities and the Black colleges," explained Alan Kirschner, vice president for programs and public policy of the United Negro College Fund, to which the participating colleges belong.

Dr. Julius Scott, president of Paine College in Augusta, Georgia, said, "Some of us had thought Israel arrogant or pretentious, but. . .I began to be more sensitive to the problems Israel faces."

Their Israeli hosts emphasized Israel's vulnerability with maps and lectures. Dr. Myer Titus, president of Philander Smith College in Little Rock, Arkansas, said, "The Israelis told us their strategic concerns for protecting Israel. There was an intense effort to impress upon us the necessity for a buffer zone between Israel and Jordan."

A visit to an Arab village was included on the agenda. At the village, the presidents were shown around the local school by the principal. The children seemed proud of their school, said Dr. Titus. The one hint of the problems faced by Israeli Arabs came, however, when the principal showed the visitors the home he was building. He had so far been denied electricity by the Israeli authorities, ostensibly for not following zoning regulations.

One of the most memorable aspects of the trip to Israel, the presidents said, was the visit to the Children's Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem at which the names of children who died during the Holocaust are read aloud. Dr. Burnett Joiner of LeMoyne Owen College described the experience as "gut-wrenching. "

Whether they visited Israel or the Arabian Gulf countries, the educators returned home realizing how little they had known or understood about the Middle East prior to the visit. Professor Thornton said, "It will have a direct impact on virtually everything I teach."