PA Extends School and University Closures Across West Bank Amid Regional Escalation

West Bank, MINA – The Palestinian Ministry of Education and Higher Education announced on Monday that in-person classes will remain suspended across all schools in the West Bank, including public and private universities, UNRWA-run schools, and kindergartens, as regional tensions continue to escalate.

The decision was issued in an official statement amid ongoing military confrontation involving Israel and the United States on one side and Iran on the other. The ministry clarified that the suspension of in-person attendance, initially announced for Sunday and Monday, will now be extended through the end of the week. During this period, education will continue remotely to ensure the safety of students and staff while maintaining continuity in the educational and academic process, the ministry confirmed.

The extended closures come as Israeli authorities have imposed a comprehensive lockdown across the occupied West Bank since the escalation began, further restricting Palestinian movement and access to education, work, and essential services. The measures reflect growing concerns over the potential spillover effects of the broader regional conflict, which has already seen Israeli and US warplanes carry out military strikes on Iran since last Saturday. The attacks have resulted in hundreds of deaths, most of them civilians, and caused significant material damage to Iranian infrastructure.

The education disruption compounds an already dire situation for Palestinian students in the West Bank. Last January, UNRWA reported that more than 12,000 Palestinian children in the occupied West Bank had been forcibly displaced due to ongoing Israeli military operations in the northern areas over the past year. Human rights organizations have warned that the repeated closures, movement restrictions, and military operations are systematically undermining Palestinian children’s right to education and contributing to a growing humanitarian crisis in the occupied territory.

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The extension of school closures until the end of the week suggests that Palestinian authorities anticipate the regional tensions to persist, with no immediate resolution in sight to the military escalation that has engulfed the Middle East.[]

Mi’raj News Agency (MINA)

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