JERUSALEM, Israel - Israeli Arab MK (member of Knesset) Afu Aghbaria (Balad) said Israeli Arab school children should not study the Jewish history of the state.

Aghbaria's remarks were in response to Education Minister Gideon Sa'ar's plan to reinstate study of Israel's Jewish heritage in school curriculums, which were removed by Former Education Minister Yuli Tamir LABOR.

"I hope students in Arab schools will be exempt from this curriculum, meant only to celebrate Zionism," Aghbaria stated in a letter to Sa'ar.

"Arabs make up about one-fifth of Israel's population," he said. "Naturally they do not share the Zionist vision, which is at the heart of your new plan," he wrote.

Aghbaria also opposes the Education Ministry's plan to take school children on tours of Jerusalem.

"Regardless of the legal status of Jerusalem, which is disputed according to international law , I would expect you to push for a plan that includes tours meant to advance good neighborly relations between Jews and Arabs," he wrote.

"I would expect you to push for tours of Arab communities, those standing and those turned into rubble. The unrecognized [Bedouin] villages of the Negev should also be toured," Aghbaria stated.

Source: YNet news