(Communicated by the MFA Spokesperson)

The Foreign Ministry of the State of Israel today expressed its shock and consternation at the news that UNESCO is establishing a Chair at the Islamic University of Gaza.

The Islamic University of Gaza is a known greenhouse and breeding ground for Hamas terrorists. Only last month, the University’s Dean of Koranic studies openly called for the Islamic conquest of the Vatican and of Spain

UNESCO’s motto is that “It is in the minds of men that the defenses of peace must be constructed,” yet the Islamic University of Gaza is poisoning the minds of men for the cause of terror.

Scientists and Academics at the University double as Hamas technocrats. The Islamic University serves as an employment program and intellectual retreat for Hamas leaders. The University conducts lectures on Hamas’ radical ideology and concentrates on hostility to Israel; Hamas uses Gaza University laboratories to develop and produce explosives and rockets and has even run a course on explosive making. The university is a warehouse for weapons and a venue for secret meetings of military leaders.

UNESCO continues to damage its reputation. After establishing the Obiang prize, UNESCO is now establishing a chair linked to a terror organization.

Hamas and the Islamic University believe in extremism, violence and terror – not Education, Science and Culture. That UNESCO should choose to establish a chair in such a University damages further UNESCO’s reputation and it creates uncomfortable and inappropriate bedfellows.