Grants
There are currently 24 active grants related to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Current grants include several joint Palestinian-Israeli research, education and other bridgebuilding initiatives, including inter-religious projects, media programs and efforts to draw lessons from past people-to-people activities.
Mediation and Conflict Resolution
- University of Washington
Pathways of Hope in the Residue of Violent Conflict: Confronting Psychological Trauma in Middle Eastern Societies
A workshop program to provide advanced training in the treatment of trauma for Israeli and Palestinian clinicians, clergy and other service providers. The initiative, which will result in an Arabic and Hebrew language training manual, will enhance practitioner skills in establishing systematic community outreach, screening to identify and treat at risk community members, and improved cooperation between Israeli and Palestinian professionals in efforts to prevent enduring symptoms of traumatic grief and retaliation.
- University of California, Los Angeles
The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Archaeology, and Contested Cultural Heritage: Building Constructive Dialogue and Information Resources for Track II Negotiations
A joint American-Israeli-Palestinian research and working group program to explore options for resolving issues over such shared cultural heritage as archaeological sites, museum collections and cultural objects. The initiative will engage Israeli and Palestinian archeologists, historians, legal experts and specialists from their respective Ministries of Antiquities, as well as American specialists, in field-based research, other data collection and a series of consensus-building workshops on disputed cultural heritage. The project will result in a report that will inform Track II negotiators about general principles of heritage apportionment and possible workable solutions, an edited anthology of essays by participants, and a series of journal articles, including some on consensus building in the face of competing cultural heritage and creating productive dialogues through the intermediary of national myths and cultural heritage claims.
- Syracuse University
Moral Compensation between Palestinians and Israelis
A research and survey project to identify and articulate the expressions of responsibility and contrition for past acts that Israelis and Palestinians expect from each other in efforts to achieve a fair peace and genuine people-to-people reconciliation. The study will also explore possible means by which Israelis and Palestinians could undertake mutual moral compensation and overcome the burden of historical traumas.
- Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies
The Impact of Track Two on the Official Israeli-Palestinian Final Status Talks on Jerusalem
A research project examining the impact of some 30 Israeli-Palestinian Track II initiatives on official negotiations, focusing particular attention on efforts since 1994 to develop a permanent status agreement on Jerusalem. Based on the analysis of documentary materials and on interviews with officials and non-official Track II participants, the resulting article will explore the complex relationship between the two levels; assess the contributions to official diplomacy and the shortcomings of Track II initiatives; and suggest ways in which such initiatives can be more effective in future negotiations.
- Ben Gurion University
Borders as Bridges or Barriers? Developing Trans-Boundary Projects for Israel/Palestine
A project to conceptualize and develop plans for trans-boundary activities and cooperation across a future Israel-Palestine boundary. Based on the notion that borders can serve as bridges between peoples, the initiative will engage Israeli, Palestinian and European trans-boundary specialists and produce a report outlining the overall principles of potential cross-border cooperative programs between Israel and a Palestinian state. Products will also include a set of detailed regional and local planning documents for trans-boundary projects.
- Harvard University
Rebuilding Israeli-Palestinian Trust in the Availability of a Negotiating Partner
A program to convene a group of politically influential Israelis and Palestinians in a series of workshops that will explore approaches to reestablishing trust among themselves and in their respective leaderships and publics. The initiative, which will also consult influential individuals from key Arab states about ways in which their governments might support the peace process, will seek to develop a new framework for resuming productive negotiations, and will publish and disseminate a joint document of the group's analysis and recommendations.
- Institute of World Affairs
Elicitive Storytelling: A Palestinian-Israeli Initiative
A joint Israeli and Palestinian workshop program to build understanding and linkages among Israelis and Palestinians in Jerusalem by humanizing and sharing the personal experiences, struggles and triumphs of ordinary people. The initiative will develop and conduct ten storytelling performances in East and West Jerusalem, create an accompanying photo exhibit and mount workshops for Israeli and Palestinian audiences. In addition, the project will produce and distribute via the internet a case study and lessons learned document and a Jerusalem Stories Tool Kit for reference, presentation at conferences and use in subsequent related peace-building efforts.
- Jerusalem Rape Crisis Center
Joint Forces for Social Change
A joint Israeli-Palestinian collaborative program to create and train a cadre of Palestinian and Israeli student volunteers who will sustain long-term professional contact following their participation in a comprehensive educational project addressing sexual violence. The project will engage 20 Jewish and 20 Arab students from Hebrew University in a year-long academic study of human rights, women’s rights, leadership and the challenges of conflict resolution in a context of education against sexual violence. The participants will also receive intensive training, enabling them to conduct seminars on sexual violence at some 50 high schools and youth clubs in Jerusalem, reaching an estimated 10,000 schoolchildren and youth aged 10-18. Additional activities will include the organization of monthly evening forums to be held in the two communities, and a retreat for the 40 students at the end of the project to examine and evaluate the year's activities and plans for future joint activities. The project will also result in an outreach manual in Hebrew and Arabic.
- Seeking Common Ground
The Building Bridges for Peace Project: Measuring Long-Term Impact of Intergroup Interventions, the Israeli-Palestinian Case
A project to design, develop, implement a longitudinal evaluation of a peacebuilding program engaging Palestinian, Israeli and American youth. The initiative will address two gaps in the field: (1) the need for new theories of change to hypothesize if and how the impact on participants of peacebuilding intervention programs is sustained over time and transferred to community members; and (2) the development and application of evaluation methods specifically designed to measure the impact of such programs. The project will result in a framework for evaluating intergroup interventions, evaluative instruments and a final report that will guide practitioners through the impact evaluation process and give a detailed review of the outcomes and best practices of the "Building Bridges for Peace" model. The findings, which will be disseminated among organizations, foundations and other institutions that conduct, study or evaluate intergroup programs, will help maximize the impact of peacebuilding intervention programs.
- University of Duisburg-Essen
Beyond Managing the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: Toward a New People-to-People Agenda
A research project to examine the efficacy and viability of initiatives designed to promote Israeli and Palestinian peacebuilding at the grassroots level. The project will focus on a sample of 40 Israeli and Palestinian people-to-people organizations. Through sociometric data collection and questionnaires, the study will explore the structure of of these organizations, how they have functioned and dealt with challenges to bridge-building work, whether viable coalitions have developed among Israeli and Palestinian groups, and what lessons may be drawn from past people-to-people initiatives that could inform and help shape future, more successful efforts. In addition to producing two journal articles and a technical paper, the project will draw on the research findings to construct and implement a people-to-people model to promote conflict transformation in the Israeli-Palestinian arena. The resulting data set will be made available on-line to the wider social scientific community.
Religion and Peacemaking
- Catholic University of America
Holy Places and the Holy Land: A Legal, Theological, and Policy Analysis
An American, Israeli and Palestinian research project to examine the legal, theological and policy issues related to the holy sites of Christianity, Islam and Judaism in Israel and Palestine. The study will explore and clarify the evolving laws, regulatory policies and theological positions pertaining to the holy sites, with a particular focus on positions regarding the exclusivity or shared accessibility of those sites. The initiative, which will result in a set of articles and a book, will include two conferences that identify holy places from legal and religious perspectives and explore approaches to shared access as a vehicle for coexistence.
- George Washington University
Judaism on Violence and Peace
A project exploring Jewish views on peace and violence as contained in Jewish texts. Drawing on a wide range of religious texts, including biblical, rabbinic, philosophical and mystical sources, the study will examine five key concepts in Judaism—war, monotheism, Jewish chosenness, messianism, and historical memory—and bring into dialogue the violent and peaceful elements of the religion. The initiative, which will result in a book entitled Judaism on Violence and Peace, will foster understanding of how a religious tradition can be both violent and peaceful and serve as a guide for scholars, practitioners and lay-people interested in religion, contemporary international conflict and peacemaking.
Media and Conflict
- Filmmakers Collaborative
Dividing Lines: Israeli and Palestinian Journalists Search for Common Ground
A one-hour documentary to promote understanding of the role of media in ongoing violent conflict. The film will trace the experiences of ten young Israeli and Palestinian journalists coming together for a three-week seminar to explore the impact of media coverage on violent conflict, and follow the participants back to the Middle East to examine how the seminar affected their lives and work. The documentary, which will address professional and ethical issues confronting journalists working in conflict zones, such as balance, objectivity, stereotyping, dehumanization and censorship, will be distributed to public television in the United States and Israel, as well as other television outlets around the world. As an educational tool, the documentary will be disseminated among journalism and Middle East studies programs and in seminars, workshops and conferences involving the media and/or violent conflict. A companion web site will also be established to sustain a dialogue about the role of media in conflict.
- Givat Haviva Educational Foundation, Inc.
All for Peace Radio
A project to support the development and broadcasting in Hebrew, Arabic and English of radio programs promoting cooperation, tolerance and peace. This joint Israeli and Palestinian media initiative will result in the airing of a series of programs focusing on: 1) joint environmental protection; and 2) bereaved families who have lost first degree relatives through violence in the conflict. The programs will seek to channel the shared feelings of loss, revenge and anger into nonviolent conflict resolution, community bridge building and mutual understanding.
- Keshev - The Center for the Protection of Democracy in Israel
Media, Human Rights and Democracy: Fostering Respect for Human Rights among Israeli Journalism Students
Keshev will develop innovative, practice-oriented multimedia curriculum materials to complement existing theoretical materials on conflict reporting for use in journalism courses at four universities and colleges in Israel (Tel Aviv University, Ben Gurion University, Sapir Academic College and Netanya Academic College). The project will culminate in the publication of 800 copies of a curriculum guide with DVDs. After two semesters of the course, a conference on training journalists in conflict zones will bring together approximately three-hundred students and other participants at Tel Aviv University to foster further discussion.
- Tel Aviv University
The Political Communication of Minority Nationalism and Ethnonational Conflict: The Impact of Arabic Media Consumption on Arab-Jewish Relations in Israel
A research project, resulting in a book, that will explore the role of Arab media in relations between the Arab minority in Israel and the Jewish state. Based on extensive pubic opinion polling, interviews with journalists and editors and content analysis, the study will examine minority media policies, media consumption and exposure, and their impact on ethno-national conflict in Israel.
Education
- Arab Association for Human Rights
Dalil: The Arabic Teachers' Guide to Human-Rights Education
A project to develop, test and publish an Arabic-language teachers' guide to human rights education for secondary school educators in Israel. The guide will be distributed in the Arab education sector throughout the country and will be made available to the broader Arabic speaking world on the organization's web site.
- Bar-Ilan University
Relating to the Other Side
An education program to broaden the base of support for mutual respect and coexistence in Israel targeting Jewish religious educators and schools—a sector that hitherto has largely been ignored by coexistence education. Drawing on Jewish religious lecturers, texts and related resources, and including intensive study of Palestinian history, culture and perspectives, the initiative will explore the notion that intolerant attitudes that degrade the rights of others are contrary to Jewish beliefs, while tolerance and willingness to live together are traditional Jewish values. Targeting some 25 teachers in religious high schools, yeshivas, and girls seminaries, the project will organize a year-long series of lectures, discussions, and meetings, including those with Palestinians at counterpart education institutions in Israel. Engaging Palestinian educators, the project will publish and disseminate among the national-religious school system 10-15 lesson plans for teaching coexistence values and related themes.
- Columbia University
Community Based Institute on Peace Education
In collaboration with local partners, the project will organize four-to-six workshops, each lasting two days, on peace education in community and school settings. Sites will be chosen from a list of local partners in eleven countries: Colombia, Hungary, India, Israel, Japan, Pakistan, the Palestinian Territories, Peru, the Philippines, Turkey and Ukraine. Grant products will include: 1) a companion organizers' manual that will provide materials on peace education, organizing procedures, and training process instruction; and 2) an interactive web site to encourage global dialogue and resource sharing on peace education.
- Middle East Children's Association (MECA)
Education and Bi-National Work in Intractable Conflict
A series of uni-national and bi-national training workshops for 30 Palestinian and Israeli facilitators to: 1) enhance their facilitation skills in the complex Israeli-Palestinian context; 2) improve their capacity to meet the education needs of the 140 teachers participating in MECA's teacher education programs; and 3) develop evaluative tools to accompany and assess the group's educational work. Implemented by Israeli and Palestinian co-directors, the initiative resulted in a manual and evaluation tools for MECA facilitators and others active in the field of peace education.
- Mosaica Center for Inter-Religious Cooperation
The Jerusalem Inter-Religious Educational Leadership Project
An inter-religious dialogue program engaging religious Jewish and Muslim high school principals and educators from West and East Jerusalem. Some 20 principals will participate in ten monthly workshop sessions followed by a five-day seminar. Additionally, 80 teachers from the same high schools will participate in parallel monthly meetings. In addition to addressing issues of tolerance, acceptance and mutual understanding, the initiative will result in jointly developed Jewish/Muslim curriculum and booklets in Hebrew and Arabic on resolving inter-religious conflict . The project team will also work with educators to develop and implement student-oriented projects based on the principles and vision set forth in the Alexandria Declaration—a document prepared by religious leaders from the Muslim, Christian and Jewish communities seeking to end violence and bloodshed in the Middle East.
- University of Haifa
Preventing the Relapse of the Effects of Peace Education in a Region of Protracted Conflict
A research project to assess the impact of peace education programs in the Israel-Palestine conflict. Targeting two peace education initiatives, the study will survey 910 Jewish and Arab high school students to measure the programs' impact—whether the affects are short lived or sustained and why. Researchers will focus particular attention on the efficacy of the induced compliance paradigm or role-playing approach whereby participants present and defend their adversary's position. The research findings, which will be presented in a report in English, Hebrew and Arabic and in journal articles, will shed light on the limitations of peace education programs in regions of protracted conflict and suggest ways to overcome the deleterious effects of external social and political forces on such programs. The project will also result in a manual on the induced compliance procedure and a series of training workshop for peace educators.
Conflict Analysis
- London School of Economics
Democracy and Terrorism: The Impact of Political Inclusion or Exclusion on Islamist Movements in the Middle East
Based on investigations into individual Islamist movements and the political environments in which they operate, this study will assess whether the emergence of Islamist terrorism is linked to the absence of political participation and repression. The initiative will also explore whether non-violent Islamism is the product of greater respect for democratic and human rights principles and of political inclusion. Case studies will include al Qa'eda, Hamas, Hezbollah, Groupe Islamique Armé, Gamaa Islamiyya, the Jordanian and Egyptian Muslim Brotherhoods, the Tunisian Nahda Movement, the Turkish Justice and Development Party, and the Sudanese and Iranian Islamist movements. The project will result in a book to be published with the provisional title, Democracy and Terrorism in the Middle East.
- San Diego State University Foundation
A Winnable War? Responding to Terrorism
A project to study how terrorist organizations choose their activities; change their orientation over time; and sustain their activities over a long period of time, grow, or die out. The project analyzes six factors for six groups around the world. The factors are the group's ideology and leadership; its method of communication; the degree of government coercion; internal conflict within the group; changes in the group's financing and political support; and the dynamics of negotiated compromises. The groups studied are Hamas in Israel, Al-Qaeda in Islamic countries, the IRA in Northern Ireland, the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka, the Kahalistan (Sikh) movement in India, and the Naxalite movement in India and Nepal. The project will produce a book, several scholarly journal articles, popular magazine articles and op-ed pieces.
- University of Notre Dame
Defining Dangerous: Humanitarian Security and the Challenge to Humanitarian Action
A project to examine the issue of the physical safety and security of humanitarian workers by analyzing two cross-cutting themes: first, how individual humanitarian actors experience and perceive threats to their safety and security and the measures designed to protect them; and, second, the strategic and operational impact of security issues on humanitarian action in general. Using survey data from humanitarian organizations, the research will provide practical and policy recommendations about the effectiveness of security measures, including training, in addressing the threats and risks that humanitarian workers face on the job. Based upon interviews with expert informants, the research will investigate how security concerns are hampering and shaping humanitarian action, especially in a contemporary context. The project will produce two reports on the survey research, a summary article for an applied journal, and two theoretical journal articles.
- University of Westminster
Women and Islamic Resistance in Lebanon and the Palestinian Territories
This research will compare the experiences of two groups of Arab Muslim women in the context of struggles against Israel: those involved with Hamas in the Palestinian Territories and those involved with Hezbollah in Lebanon. Forty-to-fifty women will be interviewed, and a two-day workshop in London will be convened with participants from Lebanon, the Palestinian territories, and Britain. The research will also result in a scholarly article, a conference paper, and a briefing document for policymakers and non-governmental organizations.
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