File spoon-archives/aut-op-sy.archive/aut-op-sy_1997/97-04-23.075, message 2


From: "Curtis Price" <cansv-AT-igc.apc.org>
Date:          Mon, 7 Apr 1997 20:38:41 +0000
Subject:       (Fwd) Palestinian teachers strike in West Bank


------- Forwarded Message Follows -------
Date:          Sun, 6 Apr 1997 19:58:57 -0700
From:          NewsHound <speak-AT-hound.com>
To:            cansv-AT-igc.apc.org

Subject:       Palestinian teachers strike in West Bank



Here is your NewsHound news article from your "STRIKES" hound with a score "64."  For more information, visit the NewsHound website at http://www.newshound.com or send an email to speak-AT-hound.com.


Posted at 3:39 p.m. PDT Sunday, April 6, 1997
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Palestinian teachers >>strike<< in West Bank

By Said Ghazali
Associated Press Writer


JERUSALEM (AP) -- Thousands of teachers demanding salary increases stayed home from schools in the West Bank on Sunday in the first major >>strike<< against Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority.

Schools in Nablus, Jenin, Hebron, Bethlehem and Ramallah were closed, keeping hundreds of thousands of students out of class. Schools in the Gaza Strip are administered separately and teachers there
did not >>strike<<.

The >>strike<< was called by the West Bank Teachers Coordination High Committee, which is demanding salary increases of between 85 and 100 percent.

The current average salary for Palestinian teachers is about $400 a month. The U.N. says basic monthly expenses like food and housing cost an average-sized West Bank family of seven $790.

The >>strike<< follows a year of protests by the teachers -- including partial >>strikes<< and marches in the major West Bank cities.

Last month, a ministerial committee appointed by Arafat to discuss the teachers' demands offered a 10-percent raise.

On Saturday, Education Minister Yasser Amr fired 19 teachers who organized the protests. He said Sunday that he had rescinded the decision.

Groups of students protested outside the Ministry of Education offices in Hebron on Sunday, demanding Amr's resignation.

Amr told the Voice of Palestine radio station that Arafat and the finance minister told him there was no money for teachers. But Taha Nassar, a teacher in Hebron and one of the >>strike<< leaders, a
cused the Palestinian Authority of mishandling its finances.

Amr said countries that have pledged money to the Palestinian Authority have not given all the money they promised, and accused teachers of challenging Arafat's government at the time of severe poli
ical crisis.



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