Curriculum changes · Saudi Arabia · 2023–2024 review

Recent reviews found significant removals of hostile content, alongside continuing religious intolerance.

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2023–2024 review

Curriculum changes · The lesson changes because someone rewrites it

Recent reviews found significant removals of hostile content, alongside continuing religious intolerance.

A documented revision

The 2023–2024 textbook review reported further removal of hostile portrayals and material that had appeared in earlier editions. These changes matter because the same formal school system that transmitted prejudice can revise its content. The earlier passages should not be presented as if they were necessarily still being taught unchanged.

What remained in 2024

USCIRF’s August 2024 assessment noted progress while identifying remaining intolerant religious claims, including descriptions of other faiths as false. Its account concerned specific teaching and policy conditions. It did not establish that every Saudi person held an antisemitic view or that all problems had been resolved.

Reform changes a channel, not every belief

Removing a passage reduces one official route through which hostility can be learned. It does not measure how quickly earlier beliefs disappear from families or wider society. The meaningful historical change is institutional: a state can withdraw authority from an accusation it once helped repeat.