The show where children learn Tel Aviv is a ‘Jewish colony’ and do an ‘apartheid’ puzzle

A children’s exhibition on Palestine at Peterborough Museum depicts Tel Aviv as a “Jewish colony”, features the word “apartheid” in a puzzle activity and refers to Israeli actions in Gaza as “plausible genocide”.

The month-long display, which is organised by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, is titled Palestine: From the Bronze Age to the Present Day, even though the name “Palestine” does not appear until late antiquity. 

One exhibit shows a map of “Palestine” – made in 2022 – that erases Israel entirely. The map also describes Palestinians in Israel as living in “Palestine 1948 (Israel)”; and represents 185 Israeli cities and towns, including Tel Aviv, as“Jewish colonies 1948”.

The exhibition includes various interactive activities to engage children, such as map-colouring and crossword puzzles, with many activities framing the conflict in stark, politically charged terms.

A wordsearch puzzle lists among answers the word “apartheid”, while one book on display, entitled Jewish Voices, features Jewish pro-Palestinian protesters and a quotation that refers to Israeli actions in Gaza as “plausible genocide”.

Another book shows a map of Palestine in 1917 that omits the area of Transjordan – now the state of Jordan – that originally formed part of the Mandate of Palestine entrusted to Britain. Other maps in the book dated 1948, 1967 and 1995 have areas shaded in blue which are represented as “under Jewish control”.

The accompanying text in the book says that “in 1948, Zionist military forces expelled 750,000 Palestinians from their homes”.

At the centre of the exhibition stands a tall roller-banner timeline, headed “A History of Palestine – From the Bronze Age to 1948” , which glosses over Jewish history and the Jewish connection to the land.

In the entry for 1200 to 2000 BCE it mentions the “seperate [sic] kingdoms of Israel, Judah and Samaria” emerging in the “interior and north”. The term “Palestine” first appears in the entry on Alexander the Great’s conquest of Western Asia from 322 BCE, that does not refer to Judea.

In later antiquity, the timeline mentions the dispersal of the Jewish population after the Roman conquest, the defeat of the Jewish revolt and the expulsion of the Jews from Jerusalem, going on to say that Jews were allowed to return after the conquest of Palestine by Islamic armies in the seventh century.

In the period 1516-1917, it notes that “the Zionist movement encourages emigration of Eastern European Jews, begin to displace local population”. The final entry for 1946/9 says that the “Zionist terror campaign steps up. May 1947 British withdraw. Arab states intervene but are defeated. 750,000 Palestinians expelled.”

But it omits the rejection of the UN partition plan by Arab states, seeking refuge from the Holocaust or the mass emigration of Jews from North Africa and the Middle East.

A number of boards explain about different communities in Palestine – Muslims, Druze, Christians and Jews. While another board is dedicated to Gaza and its ongoing “siege” by Israel, it fails to mention Israel’s 2005 withdrawal and the subsequent rise of Hamas.

Rather than presenting a balanced account of the events of October 7 and its aftermath, the exhibition focuses on poems from Palestinian children, part of a project that connects young people from around the world to Palestinian youth.

The museum said it had not been involved in the detailed planning of the exhibition which was being held in its community gallery. 

"It is a community run exhibition, organised, funded and run by a Peterborough based community group, which is using the Museum as exhibition space only,” a Museum spokesman said. ​​​​

"We aim to be a neutral space which provides our visitors with knowledge about a diverse range of subjects in order to open up conversations."

The PSC was contacted for comment.