Ukraine releases a new school history textbook, and it's the most pro-Israeli in the world

Never before has the topic of Israel, the history of the Arab-Israeli wars, and the Middle East conflict been covered in textbooks so thoroughly and objectively, without Soviet stereotypes but with accurate pro-Ukrainian and pro-Israeli accents.

The textbook World History for 11th-grade students in Ukraine, written by Dr. Igor Shchupak, director of the Tkuma Ukrainian Institute for Holocaust Studies, and recommended by Ukraine's Ministry of Education and Science, has been published. Commissioned by the state, the textbook covers the period from the end of World War II to the present, highlighting trends in society, culture, and everyday life. Readers can download supplementary video and audio materials by scanning the QR codes provided alongside the text.

Individual chapters focus on the political, economic, and cultural history of key world countries. The history of Israel and the conflict in the Middle East together take up eleven pages, almost twice as many as the chapter on the history of all African countries. The fight of the Jewish national movement to establish a Jewish state is described in detail, as are the difficulties with the adoption of UN Resolution No. 181 in November 1947 that ended the British mandate. The author notes that the Arabs did not accept the decision to create two states — Arab and Jewish — and launched an active war against the Jewish population.

The textbook highlights Ukraine's role in creating the State of Israel. In early 1948, when the USA proposed repealing UN Resolution No. 181 on the two-state solution, V. Tarasenko, a representative of the Ukrainian SSR to the UN, made a démarche, thanks to which the resolution came into force. This is the role Ukraine played in creating the State of Israel, according to the textbook.

Text inserts provide information about Israeli prime ministers David Ben-Gurion and Golda Meir, a native of Kyiv. The entire history of Israel's wars — the War of Independence (1948–49), the Sinai War (1956), the Six-Day War (1967), and the Yom Kippur War (1973) — is presented in the spirit of empathy with Israel, which fought for its survival while being surrounded by enemies. The textbook also highlights the aggressive role the USSR played in supplying weapons to Arab countries and in their launching wars against Israel.

The textbook covers all the stages, problems, achievements, and failures of the Middle East settlement, starting from the Camp David Accords between Israel and Egypt in 1978 to the present day, including the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October 2023, the mass killing of Israeli civilians, and Israel's Iron Swords operation against terrorists in the Gaza Strip.

The textbook rightly emphasizes that "[f]or 15 years, Hamas militants have exploited humanitarian aid provided to Gaza Strip residents and massive amounts of funds and construction materials in order to create a network of underground military communications and structures. These were to be used for hiding and moving terrorists, producing and storing weapons, and keeping hostages."

A separate paragraph is devoted to Ukraine-Israel relations, highlighting such events as the establishment of diplomatic relations on 26 December 1991, the introduction of a visa-free regime in 2011, and Ukraine's condemnation of Iran's missile attack on Israel in April 2024.

The Jewish-Israeli theme, the issues of antisemitism, and the Holocaust are addressed in multiple sections of the textbook. For example, the section on Soviet history discusses the anti-Jewish nature of the campaign against "cosmopolitans" in the late 1940s and the Doctors' Plot of 1953. The section on the history of science recognizes the significant contribution Abram Ioffe, a native of the Poltava region, made to modern physics. The section on the history of Germany tells how Chancellor Willy Brandt knelt in 1970 before the Warsaw memorial to the heroes and victims of the Jewish ghetto uprising as a sign of Germans' repenting. "Brandt is the first German chancellor to visit Israel and Yad Vashem […] He entered Yad Vashem wearing not even a yarmulka but a hat traditionally worn by Orthodox Jews. He then opened the Book of Psalms and read aloud in German from Psalm 103: 'We have committed sins and crimes. Merciful God, forgive us.' He considered it his duty to help his people overcome the past," the textbook explains.

The same chapter deals with the reaction of the current German leader to current problems: "Referring to the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel in October 2023, Olaf Scholz stated in his speech in the Bundestag: 'At the moment, Germany has only one place — standing next to Israel.' He also condemned the Palestinian Authority for 'the lack of a clear response to the Hamas attack' and announced that the German authorities would ban speeches in support of Hamas."

The chapter on the history of Poland mentions the antisemitic and anti-Israeli campaign launched by the communist regime in 1967 when it persecuted Jews and Władysław Gomułka proclaimed the existence of a "Zionist fifth column" in Poland. Approximately 15,000 Jews emigrated from Poland in 1968–69 as a result.

The chapter on the history of sports highlights the 1972 tragedy: "During the Munich Olympics, the entire world was shocked by the murder of eleven Israeli athletes and coaches by Palestinian terrorists."

Another section says that the main object of Islamic terrorist organizations is to "fight the non-Islamic world. According to terrorist leaders, the main danger to the Islamic world is the United States, other Western countries, and Israel, which are allegedly trying to conquer it and destroy the values ​​of the Islamic religion."

This extremely informative textbook is full of various facts but has some unfortunate omissions and inaccuracies. For example, the chapter on Israel's history states that "in 73 CE, the Roman emperor Titus ordered the entire territory of Judea to be called 'Palestine' after the Jewish War." However, Vespasian, rather than Titus, was the emperor at the time. More importantly, the renaming of Judea as "Syrian Palestine" occurred much later on the orders of the Roman Emperor Hadrian after the suppression of the Bar Kokhba Revolt in 135 CE. It would be appropriate to draw parallels here between the erasure of Judea's ancient name and the current attempts of the Putin regime to erase the very essence of Ukraine by replacing it with such names as Novorossiya or Malorossiya.

The biographical note on David Ben-Gurion says he was "involved in the formation of the Jewish Legion during the First World War, was among the first to join it, and served as a rank-and-file soldier." However, the Jewish Legion was set up by Ze'ev Jabotinsky, while Ben-Gurion joined it in the last months of the war as a sergeant rather than a private. Regrettably, the textbook contains no references to Jabotinsky, a native of Ukraine, an outstanding Zionist figure, and a great supporter of Jewish-Ukrainian national dialogue. However, this can be attributed to the fact that he died in 1940, while the textbook's coverage starts in 1945.

Similarly, the textbook makes no mention of prominent natives of Ukraine who became leaders of the young State of Israel, such as Israel's first Minister of Foreign Affairs and second Prime Minister Moshe Sharett (from Kherson), Prime Minister Levi Eshkol (from Orativ, Vinnytsia region), and Israel's second President Yitzhak Ben-Zvi (from Poltava). A new edition would benefit from including these names to emphasize the historical ties between Ukraine and Israel.

The generally vivid, engaging, and informative text is supplied with a surprising collection of photographs and caricatures. The author encourages not only memorization but also active reflection and discussion, stimulating students to tackle complex problems on their own. If I were a school student, it would probably be my favorite textbook.

Dr. Igor Shchupak's textbook won an all-Ukrainian selection contest, and based on teachers' choices, the state had over 165,000 copies published, more than all other textbooks for the eleventh grade combined. It has already been delivered to schools across Ukraine. A political map of the world at the end of the textbook rightfully indicates Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

Text: Shimon Briman (Israel).
Photos: Screenshots from the textbook World History by Dr. Igor Shchupak.

Translated from the Ukrainian by Vasyl Starko.