A/51/301 English Page 17 Rapporteur, not having received the Commission’s conclusions, is not yet able to report on them. 35. Concerning the overall problem of the integration of the Ethiopian Jews, who number 56,000, the Government has presented a report to the Special Rapporteur, detailing the efforts towards the "assimilation of the Ethiopian immigrants in Israel: the current situation and the objectives to be achieved". [Underlining by the Special Rapporteur.] The length of the document is such that it cannot be reproduced here in full. However, it states that "the immigration of the Ethiopian Jews has led to major problems, particularly that of their integration", and that the State of Israel is "working resolutely for their full integration into Israeli society: "Measures have been taken in areas such as housing, employment and education. A system of 99 per cent mortgages for amounts up to $120,000 has been set up for the Ethiopian Jews to enable them to purchase homes in conurbations located in the central areas, thereby preventing them from becoming concentrated in peripheral communities which offer insufficient opportunities for full integration. To provide improved employment opportunities, a series of training programmes has been created, oriented especially towards helping them acquire the basic skills required in order to adapt to the needs of an industrialized society. In the field of education, account has been taken of the fact that access to education in Ethiopia was limited; initially, children are placed in separate classes in order to acquire the linguistic skills and other knowledge that they must have in order to become integrated into mainstream classes. According to a study carried out in 1993 by the JDC-Brookdale Institute, 70 per cent of the children had joined these classes within about one year. For the 19951996 school year, 95 per cent had joined mainstream classes. To help schools to cope with this challenge, various special assistance measures have been taken, including the following: - "Teachers spend extra time with the children (1.7 teaching hours per week and per child; in the case of children who arrived after 1 January 1991, there is no limit on this extra time); - "Supplementary programmes are organized outside school hours. "Adolescents were admitted to the Aliya boarding schools (for social and economic integration of immigrants) sponsored by the Jewish Agency, while their families lived in temporary housing. As they become settled in permanent housing, the young people are encouraged to remain in the community where they live. The JDC-Brookdale Institute survey shows that in 1995 a high percentage of 14-year-old adolescents attended school in their communities. "Through all of these programmes, it has been possible to reduce the school drop-out rate significantly and to provide 12 years of schooling for most young Ethiopians. Nonetheless, their performance lags markedly behind that of other Israeli children, at both the elementary and the secondary levels. There seem to be problems of absenteeism in certain communities, but no specific information is available on this subject as yet. It should /...