Currently NSWAS is home to 55 families, roughly half Jewish and half Palestinian Arabs, and has an eventual goal of including about 140 families. We met privately with one of the village's founders, Abdessalam Najjar, who works at its "Pluralistic Spiritual Center". Here he is speaking to our group during our walking tour of some of the village's many footpaths.
NSWAS is an idealistic attempt to demonstrate the possibility of coexistence between Jews and Palestinian Arabs "by developing a community based on mutual acceptance, respect and cooperation." Its brochure states that it is not affiliated with any political party or movement, that it is "democratically governed and owned by its members." NSWAS was started from an interfaith dialogue group led by a Dominican Catholic priest.
According to Abdessalam, the group learned early on that good will is not enough to make such a community succeed. They experimented with different kinds of group interactions to begin to learn how to reconcile the different visions of the participants. Abdessalam said that the first participants weren't aware of all the complexities of what they were trying to accomplish, but learned quickly as emotions started to surface.
While NSWAS is still very much a work in progress, it has established a number of programs and institutions to extend the reach of its efforts to foster dialogue and cooperation between Jews and Arabs as well as other groups in conflict with one another. These include:
- Four bilingual, binational schools: one each in NSWAS and Jerusalem and two in the Galilee. Here is a sculpture wall comprised of ceramic plaques made by the school children:
- The "School for Peace" a center which conducts "encounter workshops" for teens and for teachers and other professionals to help them learn to interact in more meaningful and effective ways. So far 45,000 teens and 300 adults have received training at the center in group dynamics and conflict resolution. Here is a picture of the center's new building:
- The "Pluralistic Spiritual Center", which provides " a framework for encounter activities, study and reflection, based on the values of equality, justice and reconciliation." The center promotes "alternative understandings" of the scriptures of all three major faiths represented in the State of Israel and conducts seminars on the treatment of strangers, women in Islam, Jewish attitudes about Jesus and how Palestinian Christians read the Hebrew Bible. The center organizes mixed groups of Jewish and Arab youngsters who tour Israel to learn about its religions and history from both sides in the current conflict.
Can NSWAS really make a difference and, if so, how much time will be required before it has a significant impact? These were the questions we asked ourselves as we made our way to our next meeting, a discussion of large-scale geo-political problems and possible solutions with Sheldon Shulman, who has served as a national security advisor to four Israeli prime ministers, two each from the right and the left. His comments will be the subject of my next post.
