Israël

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Paulina

The “Twinned Basketball Clubs” (TBC) program is a network of joint basketball clubs that offers Palestinian and Israeli young people, ages 6 to 15, a year-round opportunity for structured, fun co-existence in a safe and supportive environment. Children participate in twice-weekly basketball and peace education activities with peers from their own cultural group. These activities, which are designed to prepare children for positive, effective joint encounters, culminate in “Twinning” sessions, in which Palestinian and Israeli youth unite for practices, games and further instruction in PPI’s unique Peace Education Curriculum. Twinnings initially occur at least twice each month, and accelerate over time as players become more comfortable with co-existence. In addition to these encounters, participants also take part in supplementary events such as biannual tournaments and an annual Peace Education retreat.
Most participants will twin with the same children for a period of several years, allowing players to form close friendships that transcend communal divides. All activities in the TBC draw on PPI – ME’s hands-on Peace Education Curriculum, developed in conjunction with the Arbinger Institute. Using a combination of interactive activities and guided discussion, the curriculum provides players with concrete tools for transforming conflict in their daily lives, ensuring that gains made on the court extend far beyond it.
Ideally, children begin the program at the age of 6 and continue until the age of 15, when they have the opportunity to join the Leadership Development Program.
Leadership Development Program (LDP): PPI – ME aims to cultivate a cadre of young leaders who graduate to PPI – ME’s Leadership Development Program (LDP) and subsequently become the coaches and leaders of the program in their local communities. At the age of 15, TBC participants have the opportunity to join the LDP. With personal commitment and dedication, every young participant in the TBC can graduate and move on to become a leader of the program in the LDP. After experiencing the benefits of cooperation, leadership, and teamwork firsthand, LDP participants are encouraged to give back to their society by mentoring children and working to promote the wellbeing of the community. This cyclical nature is deliberate; youth grow through the program and become equipped with the skills and knowledge to help others grow in turn. This sense of investment and continuity creates a strong connection to civil society.
Single Identity (SI) Program: The SI Program uses the game of basketball to teach leadership and life skills to socio-economically disadvantaged Palestinian boys and girls ages 10 – 16 years, integrating youth from refugee camps, cities, and rural communities. The program also provides professional development training for young Palestinian coaches and educators in the curriculum, and basketball coaching.
Overall, the SI Program reaches 200 children each year. Approximately 60% of the participants are female, and approximately 80% of the participants live in refugee camps.
Professional Development Program – PPI – ME recruits young adults from within its target communities to lead PPI – ME activities, training them as inter-group facilitators and elite basketball coaches via a yearly retreat and semi-annual follow-up clinics. Through the Professional Development Program, PPI – ME also facilitates the professional training of two exceptional LDP graduates a year. PPI – ME does this by offering scholarships for coaches’ certification training, which is necessary to teach youth basketball in Israel, helping these young leaders make the transition to full-fledged coaches.

- The Visitor, Training and Education Center
The project’s Visitor’s Center is designed to serve as an important eco-tourism destination, providing a source of income, while introducing visitors to Bedouin society, tradition and culture. The center also provides technical training for surrounding communities, acting as a source of ongoing empowerment, and it functions as a significant regional research and education center, serving primary and high schools from around the Negev.
- Herding and Dairy Initiative
The Herding and Dairy Initiative demonstrates a modern,
economically-viable model for animal husbandry that is
consistent with traditional practice. It produces a variety of
high-quality cheeses, and will soon utilize the full range of
herding byproducts, including dairy products, bio-gas fuel,
manure for fertilizer, and wool for weaving and crafts.
- Medicinal Plants Initiative
The Medicinal Plants Initiative preserves, documents,
and showcases traditional Bedouin knowledge in natural
healing remedies and body care utilizing desert herbs. It is
currently establishing a high-quality brand of healing and
cosmetic products, including creams, soaps, infusion teas
and essential oils.
-Indigenous Vegetable Initiative
The Indigenous Vegetable Initiative involves the cultivation
of a variety of authentic, indigenous desert vegetables,
in order to preserve heirloom desert varieties that are
disappearing from use and contribute to better nutrition
within the community. A women-led training program
helps reintroduce the cultivation of indigenous vegetables
on family-managed plots.
-Ecosystem Restoration Initiative
The project’s Ecosystem Restoration Initiative incorporates
an extensive soil enhancement, rainwater harvesting
and biodiversity enrichment agenda, demonstrating
an effective, low-impact approach to combatting
desertification.
- Integrated Infrastructure of
Green Technologies
The project site is supported by an integrated
infrastructure of green technologies. It includes a
pioneering hybrid wind/solar energy system, a state-ofthe-
art irrigation system, a bio-gas production system, a
wastewater treatment system, and a compositing facility.
 

In 2012, the PHC is involved in four main projects:
1. Air Pollution - this project in an on-going national project to improve the air quality in all of Israel. It includes several activities, such as: publication of a report in January 2012, monitoring the implementation of the Israeli clean air act which went into effect on January 2011; frequent meetings with representatives of local and national environmental authorities, encouraging them to enforce environmental laws; involvement in local and national air quality improvement programs committees and more.
2. Hazardous Materials - this project aims to reduce the potential of exposure to hazardous materials such as Ammonia, Bromine and LPG in Haifa Bay Area. Last January we attended a Knesset (Israeli parliament) committee meeting, dedicated to discussing our report about the economical costs of a hazardous material accident in Haifa Bay. We are also involved in the efforts to reduce the risk from Haifa Bay's LPG tanks and Ammonia tank.
3. Dangerous Chemicals at Home - this project aims to raise awareness within the general public, media and stake-holders (authorities, industry) to the harmful effects of specific chemicals within indoor environment, and to advocate to the authorities (ministry of Health, Agriculture, Environmental Protection and Industry, Trade and Labor) to promote policies to minimize the health effects of these chemicals. We have recently published a joint document with Public Trust, an Israeli NGO that promotes descent businesses, dealing with product labeling. There is also an upcoming brochure on safe and ecological cleaning in Israeli coffee shops and restaurants.
4. Environmental Health - this project is designed to raise awareness to the harmful health effects of environmental pollution. We have published an innovative report, dealing with the specific risks that air pollution poses to women's health through an international literature review and integration.

Jewish and human rights education with Israeli pre-military academies, soldiers, university students, rabbis and educators, and interfaith forums.
Human rights in Israel, especially against the Israeli ‘Wisconsin Plan’ in Hadera and in Knesset lobbying on budget issues. Strong interest on issues of foreign workers, trafficking of women, health care.
Human rights in OT, especially agricultural access, administrative home demolitions and additionally as these relate to the route of the Separation Barrier and violence (particular focus currently in South Hebron Hills)

The main projects of the centre include:
• Eight groups of young leadership.
• Musical lessons: Oud (traditional Bedouin instrument) and Organ.
• Sport Groups
• Learning days and conferences
• Lectures
• Theatre shows
• Developing Public Library
• Promotion of higher education

SAFE COMMS
(EUROPEAN UNION PROJECT)
RIEAS participates in FP7 PROJECT: COUNTER-TERRORISM CRISIS COMMUNICATIONS STRATEGIES FOR RECOVERY AND CONTINUITY."

: (1) Two daycare centers for children aged 3 months to three years, and seven kindergartens for children aged three to six. These facilities emphasize the children's emotional, intellectual and physical development and offer a supervised curriculum of therapies and services by a professional and experienced staff. (2) four after-school therapeutic centers which provide comprehensive services to underprivileged children from the Sderot area in first through seventh grades, five days a week, between 1pm and 7pm, ten months a year. The centers also provide full day intersession activities for the weeks when school is closed. The staff members help children gain the social and educational tools necessary to grow and learn, while remaining comfortable and cared for in a secure environment. The staff of the centers offers homework assistance, nutritious meals and snacks, group and individual activities and sports, quiet focused individual attention in a consistently supportive venue. (3) Stricken neighborhoods: Many of Reut-Sderot young families have settled in Sderot specifically to live in underprivileged neighborhoods. These new families endeavor to introduce concepts of community involvement and civic responsibility to longtime local populations. Projects are geared towards neighborhood renewal, improved educational institutions, services to local senior citizens, and various cultural activities. Two successful examples are the "Nave Eshkol" and the "Nir Am" neighborhoods of Sderot, each of which absorbed a core group of new families who strive – together with the local community of residents -- to eradicate unemployment, violence, petty and serious crime, substance abuse, vandalism and other symptoms of economic and cultural poverty.

Building Bridges: There exists in Israel a large divide between the religious and non-religious, with both groups avoiding each other, or in the worst case, openly hostile towards each other. Misconceptions, stereotypes and biases abound. Our programs bring together these two groups around their shared love of music, and they learn to see their similarities instead of their differences. This aspect of pluralism and coexistece extends to the staff, board, and student body of the conservatory.
Music For All: Community concerts and free open houses, early childhood intro to music classes, explained performances in schools, music therapy and mainstreaming for children with special needs, concerts in nursing homes and areas hit by terror attacks.
Jewish Music Renaissance Project: Music from Jewish communities around the globe is researched, recorded and performed by our orchestras. Compositions are also specially written for our performance groups. We have put out 4 cd's as part of this project.
Educational Advancement and Economic Independence for Women: Ron Shulamit runs the only B.Ed. program for women from low socio-economic backgrounds whom otherwise would not get a higher education. Through the program they gain a higher education and a career, helping them break out of poverty.

Dialogue and Identity: This school-twinning program, endorsed by the Ministry of Education, began in 2006 in cooperation with the TALI Jewish school network and the National Office of Catholic schools in Israel. In over 24 primary schools across the country, some 800 Jewish, Christian and Muslim pupils, and more than 70 teachers and principals take part in encounters designed to promote understanding, respect and intercultural tolerance, and to encourage the development of social and interpersonal skills in a multicultural society.
Educating for Change: This 30-hour in-school teacher training program gives teachers practical tools for managing and facilitating conflict-related discussions in the classroom, while providing space and time for individual and group development of the teaching staff. Principals participate in a joint Jewish-Arab forum including educational seminars and a study tour. “Educating for Change” was developed in cooperation with the Center for Civic Education in the Ministry of Education, the Jerusalem Education Administration and the Jerusalem Foundation.
Jerusalem Center for Jewish Christian Relations: JCJCR was established in 2004 to meet the challenges posed by the complex and special encounter between the Jewish majority population and the Christian Arab minority in the Holy Land. JCJCR runs a wide range of courses, conferences, seminars and lectures on the Christian communities in the Holy Land, local Jewish-Christian relations, interfaith and intercultural relations for "multipliers", such as teachers and tour guides, and key stakeholders including government officials and the Israeli army.
Healing Hatred: An innovative model for interreligious dialogue, “Healing Hatred” enables participants to understand core spiritual and moral dilemmas that lie at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Developed over the last five years by the Rossing Center, the Hebrew Union College in Jerusalem and the Holy Land Trust in Bethlehem, the course equips professionals with tools and hands-on skills of spiritual counseling for the healing of trauma and fear, in order to change the discourse from victimhood to building a joint future.
Adasha – Jerusalem Center for Interreligious Encounter: ADAShA provides foreign groups which are interreligious in their composition or in their areas of interest with a serious and systematic educational experience in the Holy Land. ADAShA's’s innovative programs encourage personal discovery through firsthand experience. Site visits, text-study, lectures, meetings with local religious leaders and visits to local organizations serve as stimuli for far-ranging theological, historical and contemporary discussions amongst the participants.
Educational Tourism: Tours in Israel are an important educational tool for shaping identity and worldview. We aspire to contribute to a reality of fair tourism - especially the tourism of educational institutions - based on recognition of the human, religious and cultural diversity of the region. We therefore conduct 3-faith tours in Jerusalem and other parts of the country to teach Jewish and Arab children about the different religious groups that make up our multi-faceted society. Check out our Fair Tourism catalogue at www.fairtourism.info.