After this hit the international press, the ministry reversed its decision.
Ma'an News Agency has a poll on its English website asking:
Not a huge number of replies, but their English speaking readers are solidly against censorship.Was the decision to destroy the folk story collection 'Speak Bird, Speak Again'
...sensible to avoid corrupting the youth? 5.56% (5) ...indicative of a necessity for censorship? 1.11% (1) ...a "bad omen" for free speech? 93.33% (84)
But the question they ask on their Arabic website, and their answers, are a bit different:
Now, this is obviously not a scientific poll, but on the other hand the only people who can participate are those who have access to the Internet and read the most "moderate" Palestinian Arabic news source. And still a plurality of these more modern Arabic speakers support not only the censorship but the actual destruction of the book!Do you support the destruction of the book 'Speak Bird, Speak Again'؟
Yesه 48.52% (7093) Noافه 43.89% (6416) Don't knowف 7.59% (1110) Total votes : 14619