CHANGING OF THE GUARDS - TEACHER-STUDENT INTERACTION IN THE INTIFADA

During the intifada-the revolt of Palestinians against the Israeli occ upation, led mainly by young people-the social order and power bases i n Arab schools in East Jerusalem were transformed by two macrolevel so cial changes: the devaluation of the teachers' status and the enhancem ent of the youths' normative standing. These macrolevel changes were a ccompanied by three microlevel changes: the rapid decline in teachers' authority, teachers' loss of control over discipline and the students ' abuse of teachers and their property, and the students' use of the I sraeli security forces to weaken the teachers' position by inciting ri ots and provoking the police to invade and close the schools. This ana lysis of the Arab public and private schools shows that the tight coup ling of public schools with administrative agencies rendered the publi c schools unable to counter the students' revolt and to retain their p osition of power, whereas the organizational autonomy of the private s chools enabled them to retain their power structure and maintain class room activities.