The children’s publishing company Scholastic is stopping shipments on a book that erases Israel from a Middle East map.
“Thea Stilton and the Blue Scarab Hunt,” about journalists hunting for treasure in Egypt, is part of the popular Geronimo Stilton children’s series translated from Italian. It was published by Scholastic in 2012. In a map at the beginning of the book that displays modern Egypt and its neighboring countries, Israel’s territory is included within Jordan and is painted red. A line denoting the Israeli border with the Sinai Peninsula does appear.
Scholastic acknowledged the error in a statement.
“The President of Trade Publishing, who was on a plane yesterday returning from Europe, has confirmed for me this morning that we are stopping shipments on this title, making the correction and going to reprint. We regret the error,” wrote Kyle Good, a senior vice president for corporate communications at Scholastic, the Times of Israel reported Wednesday.
