Education Palestine Project #2179

Abir's Garden Playgrounds for a Safe Place to Grow

by Rebuilding Alliance

Project Report | Dec 31, 2014
Work has begun on the third Abir's Garden Playground

By Donna Baranski-Walker | Executive Director, Rebuilding Alliance

All came together to plan the playground, at last

Dear Friend,

I am delighted to bring this report to you. Combatants for Peace and the villagers of Yanun have agreed on a new site for the Abir's Garden Playground, and work has begun at last.

Muhanad is still the Palestinian coordinator of Combatants for Peace - Tel Aviv/Nablus group, Maya was the Israeli Coordator when we began but now Michalo has taken that role. I am getting reports from Michalo and Maya, with Muhanad copied. Next, we plan to send Ayat, Rebuilding Alliance's Communications and Outereach Officer, to join them for their next building day in Yanun.

One more thing you'll want to know about Yanun is that it faces very real attacks on people, homes, and crops by the nearby Israeli settler outpost called Givot Olam, a branch of the Itamar settlement. The attacks were so dangerous that villager evacuated in 2002, to return with the help of Palestinian, Israeli, and International activists. Now, the Ecumenical Accoumpaniment Program in Palestine and Israel has three or four people living in Yanun and Combatants for Peace continues their work with the village in solidarity to keep them safe.

As we reported in the spring, everyone looked forward to launching the project last June, only to learn that the landowner of the site in the center of the little town revoked permission to use that land.

From Michalo, "For really long time it didn't happen and we didn't understand why. A few months ago, we understood that there is also a family from Yanun that rejects the building of the garden. This family lives now in Jordan and the ground chosen for the playground is on their land. We also planned an event with the families of Yanun and especially with the children but no one came except the head of the village, Rashed. He said that the families afraid from settlers and don't want a big events."

Michalo continues: "I'm glad to inform you that the building of the playground finally started. The mayor of "Akraba" gave us another place in Yanun and two weeks ago they start to work on it. On Friday (December 12th) our group "Tel Aviv Nablus" went to meet the families of Yanun and the children, and we played together and imagined how the playground will be. t was very exciting for all of us. I'm attaching some photos from this event and from the building of the garden."
From Maya, "I am so sorry for the long months that have past until we could finally make our plan happen. But I'm happy that finally, and not without difficulties, the building of Abir's playground has begun. As Michal, the new Israeli coordinator wrote in a different mail, the location is different but lovely as well. This week (Dec. 27th), the first step,of building a short wall around the garden has been finished. The next step is to create a mutual activity for CFP and the people of Yanun, and of course, continue with equipping the playground."

From Michalo, "We are planning a big event there soon open to the public, to plant some trees in the garden together and to do a workshop of kites for the children. i will update about the progress of the garden and our activities there."

Thank you again for your support of the Abir's Garden Playground project. Rebuilding Alliance's mission is to help rebuild war-torn communities and make them safe. We are very proud to partner with Combatants for Peace in their support of the Village of Yanun. I know you join me in wishing the people of Yanun and Combatants for Peace the very best as they continue this important project on behalf of the children of Yanun.

Sincere best wishes for a Happy New Year,
Donna

What better way to plan a playground than to play

The right spot for a playground

This Abir's garden will be a safe place to grow

Everything was ready for Phase 1: the safety wall

They worked together and finished Phase 1

The wall is now built!

Great to have Phase 1 finished. The wall is done.

Links:

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Jun 25, 2014
What Abir's Garden can do - today at noon Eastern

By Donna Baranski-Walker | Founder & Executive Director, Rebuilding Alliance

Mar 25, 2014
Getting started in Ein Yanoun!

By Donna Baranski-Walker | Founder and Executive Director

Part of the group that met near Ein Yanun

Dear Friends,

Greetings from the West Bank, Palestine! A week ago Friday, Rebuilding Alliance's Accountant, Thai Hien Ho, and I were part of a remarkable meeting near Ein Yanoun at the home of the architect who designed this our third Abir's Garden playground. An engineer was also there to meet with us and quite a contingent of Combatants for Peace members, including both Israel and Palestinian members and Combatants for Peace board members. The meeting was gracefully conducted in three languages with Tel Aviv / Tulkarem Team Leaders Maya and Mohanad translating Hebrew and Arabic into English and back.

Our goal was to approve the plans for the third Abir’s Garden Playground and Youth Theater Program. I asked for the meeting because I was concerned that the playground plan presented to Rebuilding Alliance was too expensive at $24K. With the added cost, we would not be able to also fund the youth theater program. Remarkably by the end of the meeting a solution was found.

The Palestinian landscape architect, trained in Spain, stood by his design for the playground. He explained that the steep rocky grade requires extra work for leveling and to build the retaining walls, both for the lower playground and upper picnic area level. Combatants for Peace and Rebuilding Alliance were both impressed with his design and satisfied with his explanation.

Then magic happened: When I raised my concern about also being able to fund the Youth Theater program, a phone call was made to the mayor of Agraba. On behalf of the municipality of Agraba, the mayor agreed to match our grant, dollar for dollar!

Project co-leader, Maya Katz, explained, "We have great cooperation with the Agraba Municipality. They provided a matching grant for our last project and our teams finished the parking lot and installed a garden at the new school for the village of Kirbet Twir."

So far we have transferred $12K to CfP so the mayor of Agraba confirmed that they will put in the starter $12K so that we'll complete the playground according to spec and launch the theater program! Combatant for Peace Bilal said, "We are really pleased to begin Phase 1 of the Abir's Garden playground construction in a few days time!"

If you would like to support our project again, one great day to do this will be on Wednesday, April 16th, 2014 starting at 12:00:01 PM (noon) EDT when Microsoft's Youth Spark will provide a 50% match to donations (up to $1,000 per donor). The bonus competition will end April 17th, 2014, at 11:59:59 AM EDT.

NOTE: The project that has the most unique donors on Microsoft YouthSpark's Bonus Day will receive an additional $10,000 from Microsoft. We CAN DO this: Abir's Garden reached the most donors in the last YouthSpark bonus!

Please mark your calendar for noon, Wednesday April 16th through noon Thursday April 17th!

Please call me or send email as questions arise and I'll do my best to connect you with the Combatants for Peace team! My email is Contact@RebuildingAlliance.org and my phone here is 1-970-599-331-2811.

Thank you again for all that you've done to make this remarkable project a reality.

Sincerely,

Donna

P.S. After the meeting, one of the Combatants for Peace took us to visit Ein Yanoun so that Thai and I could take pictures at the empty site of the playground. One of the villagers introduced us to the three internationals who are living in the village and working with the villagers to keep everyone safe. It is a real challenge and very scary — this village is surrounded by 5 settlements with very threatening settlers. We want to help everyone there to stay in touch with all of you, our Abir's Garden Playground donors, so that in any future moment of need we can all relay their call to our elected officials to rouse the diplomatic corps. Thank you again.

RA's Thai & Donna, CfP's Maya & Mohanad

Young photographer, son of landscape architect

In-depth discussion (in 3 languages)

Donna's 1st in-person meeting with CfP's Treasurer

Reviewing plans and the budget

Measuring the playground space in Ein Yanoun

Visiting the EAPPI team who lives in Ein Yanoun

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