Inter-Cultural Community Dialogue | The Jerusalem Intercultural Center

Neighbors…. Haredi and non-Haredi in Kiryat Hayovel and Rehavia

Neighbors. Neighbors can be a problem, even in the best of communities. But what happens when neighbors move in who are very different from you? Or when old-time neighbors’ families grow and grow, and seem to be taking over the very nature of your neighborhood? From the ‘other’ side – you’re just looking to living in a nice neighborhood with your family – what’s all the fuss about?

This has been the dynamic in two Jewish neighborhoods – Rehavia and Kiryat Hayovel – that we’ve been working in recently. Both are traditionally secular / national religious neighborhoods – in fact, they’re considered bastions of these populations in Jerusalem. Recently, Kiryat Hayovel has seen an influx of new Haredi residents. In Rehavia, there has always been a Haredi community, but in recent years more and more Haredi families were getting in the neighborhood, changing the demographics. In a city where the Haredi population is growing quickly and non-Haredi populations are feeling threatened, this can definitely cause tensions.

However, if one of our goals is to work to preserve a diverse Jerusalem, tensions are the last thing we need. So in an effort to assuage building tensions between the Haredi and non-Haredi residents of Rehavia and Kiryat Yovel, and thanks to the support of the Jerusalem Foundation and the UJA-Federation of New York, we’re working with 2 very special neighborhood forums.

In Rehavia, we’re working together with the local community council with a group of 20 Haredi and non-Haredi residents, many of them are the leaders of their communities. This includes a fascinating combination of young and older people, national religious, as well as Haredi and secular, men and women. By the end of the second meeting we’d come up with a Summary of Principles for working together. This of course doesn’t mean that individual – and sometimes far-reaching – issues have been solved. But right now we’re focusing on the ‘how we handle issues’, before we move on to the ‘what is the solution’. This includes sometimes basic statements, such as ‘live and let live’, ‘mutual respect’, ‘love of the neighborhood’ and an ’emphasis that we’re all one people’. But we all know that when tension threatens to boil over we need simple, basic principles to guide us through. This group has met twice, and will continue to meet. It has been decided to significantly expand this forum, so that broader agreements can be made and more people and groups can be represented.

In Kiryat Yovel the situation is a bit different. The entrance of Haredi families, even as a small percentage of the population, has raised numerous battle cries against the ‘Haredization’ of Kiryat Yovel, which arises in various forms from time to time. The group in Kiryat Yovel is still smaller – 8 people, all are main leaders – and thus far the two meetings have consist of ‘getting to know you’ conversations. Yet, because Haredi-non-Haredi relations are much terser than in Rehavia, the very existence of these meetings is of utmost importance. While Kiryat Yovel is a tougher nut to crack, we believe we’re on the right path, creating a safe haven for dialogue and conflict resolution. In the last meeting, two Neighborhood Council members hugged each other at the end. This was an unusual occurrence, since one was Haredi and the other was secular who is very active against the Haredization of the neighborhood. “Finally, here, I can give you a hug,” said the Haredi Council member. Another, a secular woman, requested that Haredi women come as well, so that she wouldn’t feel lonely. Currently there is no other place this could happen.

In both neighborhoods, there is energy to continue the processes, and a feeling of hope that is very important for the future of these communities, as well as for Jerusalem.

jicc2014-04-04T12:57:50+00:00May 30th, 2013|Blog, Deliberative Democracy, Identity Groups and Conflicts, Inter-Cultural Community Dialogue, Jewish Religious Denominations, Kiryat Yovel, Rehavia, Ultra-Orthodox Jews|

Happy 90th birthday Talpiot-Arnona!

We’re feeling a bit of parental pride these days. With assistance from the UJA-Federation of New York, we’ve been working intensively with residents in the Talpiot – Arnona area in methods of deliberative democracy. The goals – engage residents in their community, enable them to take ownership of their community, making it a place they want to be, and stemming years of negative migration of Jerusalem’s young families and professionals.

When we began, the Arnona-Talpiot area was officially part of the Greater Baka’a Community Council catchment area. However, residents did not cross Derech Hebron to the main Community Council facility to receive services, nor did the Community Council staff make efforts to include Talpiot-Arnona residents in its activities. From a community standpoint, it was dormant – no community events; its commercial centers were quiet, barren places; no more than 3-4 children were found in playgrounds at one time.

Last fall we began working with the Community Council, the newly-elected neighborhood committee members from the area, and interested residents. We helped them form several task teams that concentrated on bringing about practical change throughout the neighborhood in a number of areas: the environment, public spaces, Jewish-Arab coexistence, local security, forming community gardens, and more.

This activity seemed to wake up the community, and developments were quick to come. This process had given residents a chance to take responsibility for their neighborhood, to influence the public sphere, to initiate projects, to become a part of the decision-making process, together with the Community Council, and they scooped up the opportunity. The original task teams bore additional ideas for action, which, in a period of only a few months, led to the idea of a huge, neighborhood-wide event, open to the entire city, celebrating Arnona’s 90th anniversary. The fact that the event grew from idea to fruition in only a few short months – returning vibrancy to the neighborhood – is a tribute to the transformation that has taken place over the past year.

Entertainment for the whole family in the commercial center

The positive ripple effects were felt near and far. Residents rallied to the cause. Institutions, organizations, businesses and local artists – all wanted to be a part, to contribute to help make the event an amazing one. Their reward – a renewed sense of community in Arnona, a feeling of pride and solidarity.

The afternoon – evening of May 23 was chock full of events, from the fairs and performances in the neighborhood commercial center to community garden to Shai Agnon’s house to exhibits in artists’ homes, to tours of the community. (Click here for the event’s web site in Hebrew). “We are happy to invite you to a community event, the product of the community processes we held over the past year,” reads the invitation’s accompanying letter. “Over the past months we have held a number of meetings with residents in which task teams were formed that deal with many areas. [That’s where we came in, by the way.] We are surprised to discover how diverse and how many community institutions there are in the neighborhood…We invite everyone, children and adults, to participate in the event and to enjoy a wonderful chance to start on a new path in the neighborhood.”

Arts and crafts in the commercial center

We can safely say the event accomplished its goal. People came out from their hibernation, met friends and neighborhoods, got to know a little about the neighborhood in which they live. The commercial center has never seen so many people. People attended the artists’ open houses, as well as tours of the neighborhood. Indeed, the feeling of pride and excitement – and a new beginning – was palpable at all the event venues.
Residents, together with institutions in the neighborhood and staff from the Community Council, were the ones who did all the work. But we’re still taking kvelling rights on this one, and we’re proud of our part in the process.

Performance in the community garden

jicc2014-04-11T16:11:42+00:00May 23rd, 2013|Blog, Deliberative Democracy, Inter-Cultural Community Dialogue, Larger Baka Community Council|

Neighbors as Your Safety Net: Community Empowerment toward Emergency Readiness

Neighbors can be problematic (click here for a recent post about such neighbors), but they can also save your life, especially in an emergency. In the Emergency Response Networks program in east Jerusalem, we are helping bottom-up grassroots initiatives of residents to build the skills and capacity for emergency preparedness.

Imagine an earthquake. Especially in an area such as east Jerusalem, where infrastructure is poor – roads are narrow and poorly kept on good days, many buildings and additions did not take into consideration building codes and safety standards.

There is no time. Buildings have crumbled. Pipes and gas lines might have burst, power lines might be down. People might be trapped, and time is not on your side. All around the world, experts say that for the first few days – the community cannot hope for rescue teams to come from somewhere else. The formal rescue teams are going to be busy, very busy.

The best solution for these first few days is a team of local volunteers, who are responsible for the Emergency Response Network of the neighborhood. This team is trained in advance. As a part of their preparation, they create a detailed plan to have in place. All relevant infrastructure and equipment in the neighborhood will have been mapped – the schools and other public buildings, the health clinics, ambulances and other medical equipment, bulldozers, trucks and other heavy machinery, everything possible in the neighborhood that might help in an emergency. All relevant professionals in the neighborhood will also have been mapped and coordinated – from nurses and doctors to social workers to construction workers and engineers. They will have been organized into clusters by a number of resident-cluster heads. The Israeli police and other rescue workers will also have been notified, so that they know who from the neighborhood is in charge and so that rescue efforts can be streamlined.

We’ve been working to develop such Emergency Response Networks for the past 3 years, and currently there are trained teams in the neighborhoods of Jabel El-Mukaber and Silwan, Abu-Tor and Sur Baher, covering tens of thousands of east Jerusalem residents (out of 300,000 residents in East Jerusalem). Today they undergo practice simulation exercises like those described above. An earthquake is just one example of such an emergency to be prepared for. The concept of local team based on residents is novel. Usually in Israel these “local teams” are based on professionals who work in the community. But many of them reside outside the community, and it might be that in an emergency such as an earthquake, they will find it hard to come. The intensive mapping of resources is also unique to East Jerusalem – in neighborhoods that were originally villages of a few large families, where most people knew each other anyway, mapping and recruitment of community members that have expertise and tools (As bulldozers) is easier.

But we were frustrated…. The current training model enabled us to cover just 10% of East Jerusalem over 3 years. So now, based on what we’ve learnt so far, we are improving our pace. Utilizing a ‘Train the Trainers’ methodology, we are on the brink of training teams in all east Jerusalem neighborhoods over the next 2 years. Starting next week, on May 20, we are supervising the training of 12 Emergency Response Network trainers. These leaders had been trained before to be in their own local emergency team; now we are training them to train others. When these trainers complete the 40 hour course by the middle of July, they will then be able to organize and train volunteers in each of the neighborhoods, and survey the physical and human infrastructure in the neighborhoods. That work will take time (albeit, much less than in our previous model), but the results will be well worth the wait.

What is fascinating about this project is that neighborhoods do not only learn to save lives and save their neighborhoods in the case of an emergency. They also get to know one another and pool local resources. They are been empowered to help their community, whether they are doctors, social workers, teachers or construction workers. They are their own safety net. In the week of flood this winter (that ended with a full-blown snowstorm), these teams helped a lot in solving local problems of closed roads etc., whenever the citywide limited resources could not get in. This week showed the importance of these networks, even without major emergency situation.

Naomi Roff2014-04-11T16:06:59+00:00May 15th, 2013|Blog, Identity Groups and Conflicts, Palestinians/Arabs, Silwan Community Dialogue, Tsur Baher Community Dialogue|

Turning the Tables on the Project Management Training for Multicultural Project Leaders: Participants Lead a Tour of the Multicultural Nature of Jerusalem

Yesterday we turned the tables on the Project Management Training for Multicultural Project Leaders, which is supported generously by the Rosenzweig-Coopersmith Foundation. This training is intended for Change Agents and Project Leaders in Jerusalem that are doing Inter-cultural work. It is an 18-week course that covers the principles of project management, effective activism, challenges of multi-cultural groups, and the special case of Jerusalem for all its residents.

On February 19, we took the entire course out on a tour of Jerusalem. But instead of us teaching participants, they themselves taught us. They were the tour guides, they were the experts. We, and everyone else in the course, sat back and learned.

This was part of the section of the course that dealt with Jerusalem. Other meetings on Jerusalem featured 3 different panels from Jerusalem’s 3 major population groups – one on the Ultra-Orthodox population, one on the Palestinian population and one on the non-Haredi Jewish population.

We went to all different areas in the city. We went to A-Tur, Beit Safafa, Jebel el-Mukaber and Silwan in East Jerusalem. Participants were shocked at the state of infrastructures there – the lack of sidewalks, the garbage, roads and signs in disrepair – all of the lacking infrastructure that they must deal with on a daily basis. In A-Tur we learned about special education in East Jerusalem. In Beit Safafa / Pat we learned about the Max Rayne Hand in Hand School for Bilingual Education, and its unique activities, bringing together Jewish and Arab children to study in the same classroom, in Hebrew and Arabic.

A participant from the Katamonim neighborhood told us about her community, a Jewish and economically disadvantaged neighborhood that is undergoing some urban renewal processes. She also spoke about the Ethiopian community there, of which she is a part. We also went to the German and Greek colonies, where we heard about those neighborhoods from a local artist, another participant. She showed us a street exhibition of several artists that her works were displayed in.

The Haredi (Ultra-orthodox Jewish) neighborhoods also left a strong impression. For many of the non-Haredi participants, Arab and Jewish alike, this was the first time they had ever ventured into these areas and taken a close look. We went to Sanhedria, to Romema, and other adjacent neighborhoods. We went past the Belz ‘castle’; we learned what a ‘Talmud Torah’ is, what a gmach is, what a mikveh is. Even the Jewish non-Haredi participants, who had heard of the terms, learned their meaning through the eyes of their fellow Haredi participants in the course.

Naomi Roff2014-04-04T12:57:51+00:00February 20th, 2013|Blog, Courses, Identity Groups and Conflicts, Inter-Cultural Community Dialogue, Jewish-Palestinian/Arab, Ultra-Orthodox Jews|

Developing Deliberative Democracy in Jerusalem Neighborhoods – a case in Gilo

A few months ago, in cooperation with the UJA – Federation of New York, we began a project to work with a number of community centers to assimilate principles of deliberative/ participatory democracy that respects all the different voices in the community (see a previous post on this). At the Gilo Community Center, which we have been in contact with for several years, this was an opportunity to show that it is possible to collaborate successfully on a large scale, and not just to organize mass impressive events that take months to prepare and 6 months to recover from (which we did a few years ago).

In some areas of Gilo one of the major problems was parking. There are 3 streets – DellaPergola, Hamechanechet and Baruchi – that are very problematic. People park there helter-skelter in the evenings, blocking others, and one must look for neighbors who will move their cars in order to leave the parking area. It is even dangerous – ambulances find it difficult to go into and leave the streets and it also creates a problem for public transportation – the buses just aren’t able to pass. In initial conversations that we had with the professionals in the Municipality, it seemed that nothing could be done and nothing could solve the problem. According to these professionals, there are not ways to change the situation – from their perspective, the residents just needed to stop blaming the community center and the Municipality…

The community center decided to have a residents meeting and asked us to help in the process. Our approach is that we mainly mentor the community center staff and probably facilitate the actual meetings. The community center staff does most of the outreach work etc., because in the end the community center needs to assimilate the deliberative democracy methods and it knows the situation in the field much better than we do.

The first meeting with the residents was fascinating. After we listed and documented all the relevant problems that the residents and professionals raised, we moved to suggesting solutions to the problems that were collected. It is important to note that because the professional staff (including the relevant regional planner and director) sat together in this meeting and discussed the issues, there wasn’t the regular “ping-pong dynamic” in which residents complain and professionals defend themselves. Solutions that the residents or professionals thought were potentially successful but not relevant – were discussed in a respectful manner (even though the atmosphere was tense and the manner of speaking was typically Israeli…). For example, a number of residents suggested cutting down the trees between the parking areas in order to create more parking spaces. The planning officials then explained that the present situation is actually the opposite – the parking spaces were planned first, and the trees were planted later, to fill in spaces not designated -or appropriate – for parking. Thus, removing trees would not solve anything.

But, to our amazement, several elegant solutions were raised that the professional staff did not think of at all and which did seem suitable. One of them, in the context of DellaPergola Street, was to designate parking spaces according to families and thus reserve at least one parking space for each family, and the rest of the automobiles would park in other parts of the street or on other streets. We won’t get into the technical details, but it turns out that the professionals did not think about this solution because they didn’t believe that the residents would like the idea, and in any case, they assumed that someone would object and would shoot it down.

The Gilo staff called a second residents meeting. After massive advertising of the outcomes of the first meeting (which is significantly important, because there were many who didn’t come to the first meeting because they assumed that nothing would be accomplished). We enabled the residents to respond in other ways as well – email, telephone, etc. In the second meeting a lot of points and hesitations were raised regarding the designation of parking spaces. Again, the to-the-point discussion amongst all present brought about a formula that works. After the meeting, the community center staff and the regional municipal planner and director progressed in the technical areas related to the designation of parking spaces, as well as in work with all the street’s residents. A number of residents went from house to house and explained the situation and helped to designate the free parking spaces. Slowly, in discussions with tenant associations and additional residents, a map of agreed-upon designated parking spaces was formulated. There were definitely some residents who were more difficult to please, but correct work by the residents solved the problems one by one.

And it is happening as we speak – there’s just been the first day of painting the parking spaces, and the second day will take place next week. We definitely see the success of the process.

From our perspective, this is a significant case in which we showed that residents, staff and officials can cooperate together, without getting stuck in objections and bureaucracy. We believe that more and more processes like this in Jerusalem will create a more respectful atmosphere between city residents of different identities, less alienation between the residents and the ‘establishment’, and especially a feeling that the residents can be partners in the successes in the city and enjoy them. There are other successes in Arnona, Givat Messua, Baka’a and beginnings in Gonenim and Romema – but we will talk about that at a different opportunity.

jicc2014-04-11T15:52:04+00:00October 25th, 2012|Blog, Deliberative Democracy, Gilo Community Dialogue, Inter-Cultural Community Dialogue|

Developing Deliberative Democracy in Jerusalem Neighborhoods

Over the past few months, thanks to support from the Commission on the Jewish People of the UJA – Federation of New York, we’ve been working with a number of neighborhoods in the city in order to encourage and to operate processes of community dialogue and deliberative democracy.

Together with professionals in the community centers and councils, we are planning and developing processes that are adapted to the characteristics of each neighborhood’s population and to the specific issues each neighborhood is most concerned with. Our goal is to bring all the voices of all the different identities in the community to be part of a decision-making group and to enable each resident to advance ideas and initiatives that are important to him.

In each neighborhood the process is taking on its own identity, and each neighborhood is focusing on different issues. Below are a few examples of the work we’re doing:

Creating a set space for discussion and entrepreneurship. In Givat Massua (part of the Ganim Community Council) and in Arnona (part of the Larger Baka Community Council) we hold open meetings each 5-6 weeks. In these meetings, residents and community professionals raise issues connected to the public sphere (in every field: education, culture, physical development, early childhood, youth, etc.) that they are passionate about advancing. Residents come together, hold discussions, think creatively of initiatives to address the issues, and, together with professionals who are part of the discussion and the action, advance their ideas toward implementing change.

Some of the meetings concentrate on a single issue – such as youth – and discuss a number of sub-issues connected with it. For example: informal activities for youth, education for youth, youth at risk, Parents Patrol to prevent at-risk behaviors among youth, and more.

Solving problems or resolving conflicts in the public sphere, where there is a conflict of interest between residents who live in close geographical proximity (same street, neighborhood, complex), regarding an issue affecting the joint living space. For example, disagreement regarding the use of a structure, parking arrangements, rules of conduct in a public space, and more. In this situation we bring together all the stakeholders in order to raise all the needs and interests of all the sides, and we create a process of in-depth discussion and agreed-upon alternatives to deal with the conflict. One example is the process of engaging residents in solving the problem of parking on a street in the Gilo neighborhood. There is a street where there are a lot of parking problems. Some residents wanted to dedicate the parking on the street only for residents, or for paid parking, to ease the problem. Others, who had more than the allotment of cars, didn’t want the street to be designated parking. What do we do? Do we designate the street or not? Do we designate part of the street and leave the rest untouched? Meeting of residents helped to formulate remedies that are now being implemented, with the help of professionals.

In Talpiot there is a similar type of discussion over the use of a public building. The significant community of Ethiopian Jews in the area want to make an available public building a synagogue for the Ethiopian community; others want to turn it into a youth club. In the end a compromise was reached – the Ethiopian community received permission to pray in the building, while their own synagogue is being built for them.

Planning processes or building vision – in cases in which there is a need or opportunity to bring together the community to hear the different desires, positions or needs and to galvanize positions, goals and visions for the entire community to work toward. For example, there was a need in the Baka neighborhood to create agreement between all the different stakeholders on the desired direction of the planning and physical infrastructure in drawing up a new master plan for the neighborhood. Such a process enables us to envision our ideal future and to figure out how to take steps to realize this ideal state. In the process we learn, have in-depth discussions, build agreement, think creatively and develop alternatives to dealing with conflicting desires. A similar process is beginning around planning the land use of the main entrance to the Gilo neighborhood. Here, the Municipality allocated a sum of money to plan and develop the entrance to this southern neighborhood. This is a long strip that borders the Beit Safafa neighborhood. Instead of just developing the area, the Municipality is engaged in a decision-making process with the residents, involving them in discussions and making them partners in action.

Engaging the Community Council Board in community dialogue – a series of encounters between the JICC and representatives of community council boards. These are elected representatives and we work with them to learn how deliberative democracy and representative democracy can work best together. As a part of it, we create a new model of work for such boards – based on passion and resposibility in task forces, rather than ineffective committees.

In parallel to all these processes, we are holding professional development seminars for community centers/councils professionals (community workers, planners, project coordinators, absorption coordinators, youth coordinators, and more) who work in the neighborhoods. They themselves represent the diversity of Jerusalem – Haredim, religious and secular; religious and secular who work in Haredi neighborhoods. The goal of the seminar is to contribute to their knowledge of community dialogue and deliberative democracy. We currently have 18 participants, even though we originally aimed to have 11 – 12. We’ve had 2 out of a planned 5 meetings, and it has been absolutely amazing!

In this training seminar the participants are introduced to the approach of community dialogue and to the theory of deliberative democracy, as well as to leading models and principles of community dialogue. They received tools to help them implement deliberative processes in the neighborhoods, and developed their ability to act in complex situations in the community. Throughout the program, which includes a series of meetings from May – November 2012, each participant will lead a process of community dialogue in his or her neighborhood, with our mentoring and consultation.

jicc2014-04-04T12:57:04+00:00July 3rd, 2012|Blog, Deliberative Democracy, Inter-Cultural Community Dialogue, Inter-Cultural Community Dialogue Course, On Jerusalem|

Silwan Well-Baby Clinic (Mother and Baby Centre) – March 2011 – Success!!

Be aware, this is a proud blog entry! The persistent efforts we made since the beginning of 2009 to re-open the Silwan Well-Baby clinic was for us a symbol for our unique work approach in Jerusalem. And now, that these efforts were successful, we feel that it helps us make the case for our approach. During this period of time, we have seen more successful examples for our way, but still, the success with this clinic is for us a milestone.

And now – to the details.

When we began our first steps with the community leadership of Silwan in the beginning of 2009, the issue of the Well-Baby Clinic was central. This critical service had been closed at the end of 2008 and some 100,000 people (including 15,000 babies and toddlers aged 0 – 5) were left without any way to receive in their neighborhood immunizations, track the children’s growth or development, check up on parents’ functioning, etc. Israel is very proud of its well-baby clinic system, in which 97% of all babies in Israel aged 0 – 5 are served. In east Jerusalem, only one-third of all children get to the few Israeli government operated Well-Baby Clinics. Another third receives vaccinations at alternative institutions such as the Red Crescent, UNWRA, etc., and no one knows what happens to the remaining third. After the Well-Baby Clinic was closed in 2008, due to budgetary cutbacks and after a problematic implementation, the densely-populated area of Silwan was left without any type of preventative health service for young children – not public, not alternative – a difficult setback for the health and development of small children in the area. Some of the parents were taking the infants to clinics outside the neighborhood, but many did not…

Following this development, it was only natural that we come into the picture. We described our work model in east Jerusalem in a short article. It is based on the principle of finding paths to dialogue based on enabling both residents of east Jerusalem and the bodies responsible for the relevant services to achieve tangible results. The JICC is not an advocate of the residents, nor are we are a PR company for the institutions. Our assumption is that, in many cases, more than are usually obvious, all sides are interested in finding solutions, and different obstacles (cultural gaps, political/social tensions, etc.) prevent both sides from finding a solution. Our job is to bridge these gaps and overcome these obstacles.

At the beginning of 2009, we turned to the professionals in the Municipality, who are responsible for Well-Baby Clinics in the city, and they agreed immediately in principle that the Well-Baby Clinic should be re-introduced. At the same time they also pointed out a long list of difficulties: from funding, which is supposed to come from the Israel Ministry of Health; finding a suitable place in Silwan, one that is both the right size and in the right location, that does not infringe on any building codes, and whose owners are willing to rent to the Jerusalem Municipality (no small challenge); successful marketing the service, since poor marketing in which many of the residents were put off from using the service was one of the main reasons the old clinic had been closed. On the other hand, the Silwan Valley Leadership Committee, which we helped to establish and mentor, expressed much interest in helping the process move forward.

We were on the cusp of success in late 2009 as the Well-Baby Clinic was placed in the 2010 municipal budget, thanks to a process that included all the relevant professionals as well as politicians in the Municipality, and community professionals and institutions. Unfortunately, in the last few days of 2009, right before the 2010 budget was approved, it was taken out, to our grave disappointment. We described our disappointment here in this blog. This reaction rippled into an article in Ha’aretz newspaper, which is quoted in the blog entry from 2009.

Yet, as we noted even then, we continued to work toward the goal that was common to all partners. Throughout an entire year, we made sure that the process was progressing – the Municipality turned to the Ministry of Health, the residents strengthened the request with a letter of their own, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) reminded the Municipality and the Ministry of Health of their legal obligations. As a result, budgets were retained from the Ministry of Health, and the residents and the Municipality set out to find a suitable location in the neighborhood. Such a place was found, all the legal and technical aspects were worked out, and last Thursday, on 10 March 2011 a lease was signed between the building owners and the Municipality, and today the process of adapting it to the needs of the Well-Baby Clinic has begun.

We are celebrating with our many partners on the lease signing. In addition to the leaders from East Jerusalemand the professionals at the municipality and the relevant NGOs, this success could not be achieved without the help of the Goldman Fund and the Jerusalem Foundation. Our work requires precise application of efforts made by our staff to facilitate these unique processes in the city of Jerusalem – and thanks to these funding organizations, we can do it well.

But we are of course not resting. We need to make sure that it won’t take a long time to ready the building for use, to hire professional staff, that the service starts on the right foot with successful marketing efforts augmented by the residents, and more. In parallel, we need to begin the process of opening an additional Well-Baby Clinic in northeast Jerusalem, which is also in desperate need. Fortunately, we are more familiar with the process and with our partners, who will be happy to help us in this endeavor.

And of course, the Silwan Valley Leadership Committee, that can celebrate its success on this issue, continues to work on many different and varied issues in which municipal and national services need to be improved – garbage removal, road improvement, planning and construction, and more. Despite the political question as to the future of Jerusalem, east Jerusalem residents must have adequate municipal services. The alternative is unthinkable

jicc2014-04-09T17:50:38+00:00March 13th, 2011|Blog, Identity Groups and Conflicts, Inter-Cultural Community Dialogue, Jewish-Palestinian/Arab, Palestinians/Arabs, Silwan Community Dialogue|

The Jerusalem Foundation’s quarterly publication (December 2010) focuses on the JICC

We at the Jerusalem Intercultural Center have had a very close and fruitful relationship with the Jerusalem Foundation since day 1. Indeed, they were among our founding partners and continue to be one of our important strategic partners today. In 2003, in recognition of our expertise and experience, we and the Jerusalem Foundation formulated a strategy that responds to the diversity challenges in the city. A critical element includes leading new initiatives that seek to train strong leaders and agents of change, who will be able to lead widening circles of children, youth and adults – each in their own context – toward a livable future in Jerusalem, regardless of future political realities. This has included training grassroots and project leaders, providing language and communication skills and acting as a resource for all. This past summer the Jerusalem Foundation also renovated our historic building on Mt. Zion, enabling participants in our programs to enjoy our special facility with modern comforts and safety.

Jerusalem Foundation Windows December 2010 – Cover

This December’s edition of the Jerusalem Foundation’s quarterly publication, Windows, featured its leading coexistence projects, nearly all of them under the leadership of the Jerusalem Intercultural Center. The articles focus on our community work in East Jerusalem, our Cultural Competence in Health Program and our annual Speaking Arts Conference. These are, of course, are just a few examples of the work of the JICC in Jerusalem. On the cover, there is a picture of our building, newly-renovated by the Jerusalem Foundation through the generous support of Professor Dr. Jan-Philipp Reemtsma, the Hamburg Foundation for the Promotion of Science and Culture.

We appreciate this partnership with the Jerusalem Partnership and are excited to see it grow.

Link to the Windows publication (Acrobat – PDF) – click here.

For Acrobat 5 compatible version of the publication (in case the above does not open properly) – click here.

jicc2014-04-09T17:27:47+00:00December 23rd, 2010|Arts, Blog, Cultural Competence, Cultural Competence in Health Services, Identity Groups and Conflicts, Jewish-Palestinian/Arab, Palestinians/Arabs, Silwan Community Dialogue, Speaking Arts Conference|

Prepare Jerusalem for peace now – an Article

We just published an article at the Jerusalem Post and Search for Common Ground (SFCG) News service, focusing on the need for preparing today Jerusalem for potential peace scenarios. Here are the links and the text:

The Jerusalem Post (English).

PDF (English).

Hebrew, Arabic.

Text:

Prepare Jerusalem for peace now
June 26, 2010

By HAGAI AGMON-SNIR

Last month, a Home Front Command exercise was carried out in Israel. The emergency systems were tested for their response to various scenarios in case war breaks out. That same week, someone jokingly disseminated a message on the Internet regarding an emergency exercise that would be carried out to test responses for when peace breaks out. In this imaginary exercise, calming sirens would be sounded and the general public would be required to respond to the cheerful scenarios that may unfold in this new and unfamiliar situation.

In Jerusalem, the idea of preparing for peace should not be a topic of jokes. We are so preoccupied with the struggle over what the city would look like following a permanent status agreement that we are ignoring the fact that present-day Jerusalem is declining before our eyes, becoming a city in which life would be difficult even when peace finally arrives.

In east Jerusalem, Palestinian children suffer from a severely underfunded public education system. As a result, most will not find employment that can afford any kind of social mobility.

Health issues – such as development checkups – are often neglected, and health problems that should be addressed in childhood will become a future economic and social burden, even in times of peace.

Chaos in the material aspects of life is sorely evident in east Jerusalem, where things like dense construction around roads which preempt any future expansion and collapsing sewage systems are creating an irreversible reality on the ground. The poverty and neglect in east Jerusalem will not only cause hardship for the Palestinians living there but will also affect the Jews in west Jerusalem whether the city remains united or divided, because if the city remains united, the need to rectify these problems would affect the funding for the western neighborhoods; if it is divided, poverty and neglect in the east would quickly become fertile ground for crime and terror against the Jews in the west of the city.

In west Jerusalem, the nonharedi Jewish population is dwindling. The city does not attract an economically strong population or young people who are not haredim, as there a few job opportunities. It remains very attractive to the haredim for religious reasons, but they are economically weak. The deterioration of west Jerusalem is bad news for everyone: A Jerusalem that is home to large populations that are economically weak will be a miserable city for all those still left in it.

DESPITE ALL these threats to the future of the city, too often Jerusalem’s municipal decision-making process is shaped by considerations that contradict local interests and cater to global politics. One example is Jewish construction beyond the Green Line. The construction in Ramat Shlomo in north Jerusalem and in Gilo in the south made headlines across the world. Yet, anyone who has taken part in Israeli- Palestinian negotiations on Jerusalem knows that in any reasonable scenario, these neighborhoods will remain on the Israeli side. Moreover the construction in these neighborhoods is of high importance to the Jewish sector in the city, since construction for haredim in the north and for non- Orthodox in the south decreases the need for the haredi population to move into the secular neighborhoods in southern Jerusalem.

Reducing this pressure would strengthen west Jerusalem and this in turn, would benefit the residents in the east. Whether Jerusalem is united or divided, economic and employment cooperation between the two parts of the city keeps them intertwined and interdependent.

However, as Israel refuses to differentiate between legitimizing the building in Gilo and legitimizing the settling in the heart of the Palestinian neighborhoods, the Palestinians and the rest of the world do not make this distinction either. The world hears about Jews who enter homes in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood after its Palestinian inhabitants are evicted. The result: worldwide political pressure to stop the construction in Gilo and Ramat Shlomo, the same construction that can contribute to the prosperity of the city.

Israel, in response, toughens its stance on Palestinian construction in Silwan. This brings only harm to all the residents of Jerusalem Almost 800,000 people live in Jerusalem, from a variety of religions, nationalities, religious outlooks and ethnic groups. When peace comes this diversity can turn into a wonderful resource for anyone who is interested in visiting or living in Jerusalem – if only we could save the city from its current decline.

For this to happen the decision-making process on the municipal level must shift to a professionalism dedicated to improving services for all the residents of the city, one that sets aside global considerations. A greater focus on these issues at the municipal level will make Jerusalem friendlier to its inhabitants. And paradoxically, focusing on its own population’s needs can help turn Jerusalem, even in the eyes of the world, from a political burden into a universal resource.

The writer is the director of the Jerusalem Intercultural Center and can be reached at hagai@jicc.org.il. This article is published in conjunction with the Common Ground News Service and forms part of a special series on Jerusalem.

jicc2014-10-08T19:44:13+00:00June 26th, 2010|Blog, Cultural Competence, Identity Groups and Conflicts, Inter-Cultural Community Dialogue, Jewish Religious Denominations, Jewish-Palestinian/Arab, On Jerusalem, Palestinians/Arabs, Ultra-Orthodox Jews|

Silwan Mother and Baby Centre – December 2009

In an article we published recently, we described our model for resident participation in decision making in East Jerusalem. This model aims to respond to the anomalous relations between Palestinian residents of Jerusalem and the Israeli establishment. We focused on our special role as a non-partisan liaison agent who facilitates the dialogue between the two sides. At the end of the article, we pointed to one of the issues we have been working on – the Silwan Mother and Baby Center, that was shut down in December 2008, creating a void of baby care (including immunizations, growth control, etc.) for around 100,000 residents.

Indeed, last year, we received a request from residents in Silwan to help them in this case. We contacted the Jerusalem municipality and created a dialogue channel that involved all professional levels at the municipality, as well as all relevant portfolio holders at the Municipality Council. As a result the two sides achieved the following understanding: the municipality will fund the reopening of the center in 2010, while the residents will help in overcoming obstacles such as finding an appropriate location for the clinic in the village and spreading the word about the renewal of the service.

However, a week ago we found out that at the final stages of approving the municipal budget for 2010, the funding for the Silwan Mother and Baby Clinic was cut out. This story was covered on Haaretz Newspaper, December 20, 2009, in Hebrew and in English. Here are two citations from the article:

Professional workers in the municipality’s community authority recently recommended to the mayor that a well-baby clinic be opened in Silwan, which would also serve the residents of adjacent Arab neighborhoods such as the Old City, Ras al-Amud and Abu Tor. The recommendation came in the wake of discussions they had held with residents of Silwan under the aegis of the Inter-Cultural Center in Jerusalem [emphasis added]. It was suggested that a clinic be opened in the Jewish Quarter at the same time.

Haggai Agmon, director of the Inter-Cultural Center [emphasis added], a non-profit organization that works to assist the city’s different ethnic groups become involved in communal life, says that “the urgent need to open a well-baby clinic in Silwan was agreed upon by both sides but to my great surprise, someone took it off the budget at the last minute.”

In the following week, we helped the residents and the municipality officials in their efforts to retrieve the budget. In between, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI), sent a letter to the Mayor, reminding him that there is a Supreme Court decision from 2001 demanding adding more Mother and Baby Centers in East Jerusalem. Nevertheless, so far the budget item has not been restored.

This is very disappointing, and maybe typical of the situation in Jerusalem. However, as a non-partisan organization that identifies issues that are important to all sides – we will continue to work in the coming weeks and months, with the residents and with municipality officials, towards the reopening of this important service for babies. In the course of last week, we found out how much support we have on all sides for our actions, and although we haven’t completed the mission yet, we feel that we are on the right track.

jicc2014-04-09T16:42:47+00:00December 25th, 2009|Blog, Identity Groups and Conflicts, Inter-Cultural Community Dialogue, Jewish-Palestinian/Arab, Palestinians/Arabs, Silwan Community Dialogue|

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