An intensive weekend retreat, with 80 Israelis and Palestinians young adults, creates the space for positive first interaction with 'the other', trains them in active interfaith encounter and how to lead it, and consolidates them into a joint community that then starts regular monthly encounters. This was tried numerous times and proved effective.
This project addresses the well known challenge of sustainable Israeli-Palestinian peace. The existing ignorance of 'the other', enabling prejudices and fears, makes conflicts possible. Participants, from both communities, engaged in deep and positive interaction self-educate to replace negative attitudes by mutul understanding, respect and trust. The group develops into a "mini-community" modeling the desired inter-communal relations, growing gradually to include the larger communities
Intensive 2 day retreat: 3 sessions of joint interfaith conversation - from the perspectives of the 3 religions and around retreat's theme, prayer session, social evening and joint meals and stay. Ends with evaluation and planning for the future. During the retreat the participating young adults are trained in the extremely effective active Interfaith Encounter Approach - which facilitates deep interaction, reviels similarities and teaches to handle differences constructively.
The 80 transformed and trained participanting young leaders will start on-going Israeli-Palestinian encounter activities, creating mini-communities modeling the desired inter-communal relations, gradually amending the overall inter-communal relations between Israelis and Palestinians.
It was the first time for me to watch a Jewish prayer and I felt the urge to dance and clap hands. It is the first time and I feel I connect to it and love it from the inside.
- Aiman from Nablus, Palestinian participant in a young adults' retreat
Total Funding Received to Date: $2,966
Remaining Goal to be Funded: $9,784
Total Funding Goal: $12,750
This project has provided additional documentation in a Microsoft Word file (projdoc.doc).
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Jerusalem,
Israel
http://www.interfaith-encounter.org
Executive Director
Jerusalem,
Israel
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