The School for Peace

The School for Peace always follows up its youth encounters with meetings at the schools after a few months. We happy to share some of what came out after one of our encounters with you, who have helped make this encounter for Jewish and Palestinian high-schoolers possible:

Students of Givat Brenner remembered the workshop very well and talked about it as a significant, empowering, and thought-provoking experience. Some of them mentioned that, after the workshop, they suddenly were much more conscious of issues involving the relations of Jews and Arabs in Israel. Some of them talked bout how this influenced the way they studied and analyzed materials for their history matriculation exam (bagrut). In general, the workshop created a desire to continue to learn about the other group, to conduct additional meetings and get to know the other culture better.

At Aljalil School in Nazareth, students came out of the meeting with a sense of moral power and a deeper view of the conflict. Moreover they emphasized the encounter's advantage as a framework facilitating this sort of dialogue of equals. In their opinion, this is a framework that gives legitimacy to political discussions without fearing the outcome. One of the girls expressed this very well, saying: "Where could we talk to them about this on the street, or in a dress shop? There is no place as appropriate as this workshop."

Links:

• American Friends of Neve Shalom/Wahat al-Salam