The book, which is designed for use in schools from this school year, is aimed at 8-9 year old Arab children in Israel's largely separate public school system. Arab citizens make up about a fifth of Israel's population of seven million.

The edition uses the previously taboo word "nakba" -- Arabic for catastrophe and the Palestinian term for the 1948 founding of Israel in a war when some 700,000 Palestinians fled or were expelled from their homes.