| Posted: April 17 2005,05:17 |
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PROGRESS: Has your organization seen
progress toward a culture of peace and nonviolence in your domain of
action and in your constituency during the first half of the Decade? |
Ta`awon:
The Palestinian Conflict Resolution Institute is a Ramallah, Palestine
based, non-profit, non-governmental institution whose mission is to
promote the use of peaceful conflict resolution techniques among a
generation of future leaders through the design and implementation of
unique programs and services.
During the mentioned period Ta'awon
had reached more than 50,000 beneficiary in Palestine through the
development and relief projects and programs, the majority of Ta`awon`s
beneficiaries are youth from 15-25 years old distributed in all
Palestinian districts.
1) PROGRESS
By the establishment of
the Palestinian Authority people saw a far light of peace, but this
light disappeared as a result of the Israelis occupation and the
invasion of the Palestinian cities in addition to destroying the
capacity of the Palestinian Authority to function ( In the security ,
economical, ..Etc levels).
Ta`awon actively worked to promote Youth
participation and many youth leaders are demanding the youth rights,
struggling with Palestinian legislators to accept new youth policy.
Increasing the women quota in the local councils is a practical
achievement of non-governmental institutions including
Ta’awon. The increasing number of volunteers around us,
and the increasing number of civil society organizations working for
peace and the dissemination of the culture of peace in the West Bank
and Gaza are facts of progress in dissemination of the culture of
peace. In addition to youth trainers in peaceful ways in dealing of
conflict as an output of our work (in addition to others Palestinian
NGOs programs).
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OBSTACLES: What are the most important obstacles that have prevented progress?
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2) OBSTACLES
Three main obstacles are challenging the dissemination of the culture of peace in Palestine:
1.
The climate created after the failure of the peace process in the
region is greatest obstacle in front of dissemination of the culture of
peace. Palestinian lost the hope in peaceful resolution. Decade of
negotiations without returning of the minimum acceptable Palestinian
rights, the contentious enlarging of Israeli settlements in the West
Bank and creating new ones, the use of extra forces of killing
Palestinians from the Israeli Army and
2. The building of the
apartheid WALL created large prison for Palestinians and threatens to
transform the West Bank into new closed Gaza strip and is really ending
the hope for two states solution in addition to the economical, social
and security obstacles.
3. On the internal Palestinian level
some reasons are real challenges in front of dissemination of culture
of peace. Corruption within PA, domination of men over women in
Palestinian Arab culture and traditions, the appreciation of power to
deal with conflict.
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ACTIONS: What actions have been
undertaken by your organization to promote a culture of peace and
nonviolence during the first half of the Decade?
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3) ACTIONS
T'awon
Association for Conflict resolution was established in 2002, the whole
work of Ta'awon Association is to promote the culture of peace mainly
among Palestinian youth sector. Until now Ta'awon had implemented the
following actions:
1) Fusion of Palestinian security apparatus in the peace building:
The
implementation of this action was in cooperation with Palestinian Peace
Coalition. This was a pilot project and was targeting 130 officers from
5 security apparatus in Hebron area/ West Bank. The aim of the project
was the preparation of the security forces for the fusion in the peace
process, and to enhance their capabilities for participating in
building stable civil Palestinian society. During the project
implementation the officers were trained in human rights concepts,
culture of peace and the use of peaceful techniques in conflict
management and resolution. This action reflects from the other side the
necessity of cooperation between governmental and non-governmental
organizations working for peace building in Palestine.
2) Fusion the culture of peace in the policies and strategies of civil society organizations:
The
idea of this project was involve a big number of civil society
organizations working on developmental issues like agriculture and
youth etc in the peace building process in Palestine. This action was
targeting 150 civil society organizations in 8 West Bank districts.
Representatives of these non-governmental was targeted in training
courses for the preparation of trainers in the Culture of Peace, after
the training each of these active members of the local community
organizations planned to disseminate the culture of peace among other
members of his/ here organization on local level. Many of these planned
workshops took place, discussions and plans were conducted inside the
local organization on how they can introduce peace during their
developmental work and enhance the process of dissemination of the
culture of peace in Palestine.
3) Encouragement of the Dialogue among Palestinian YOUTH as a way of peace environment creation in region:
This
on-going project is targeting Youth organizations in three main West
Bank districts Ramallah, Hebron and Nablus. During the project three
district groups from different local Youth organizations will be
qualified to carry the dialogue process between Youth movements in
different civil society organizations on the level of villages, cities
and refugee camps in order to exclude the violence as a way of conflict
resolution and contribute in enhancing the peace environment in
Palestinian community and in the region. Ta'awon implements this
project in cooperation with the Networking for Peace Office/ Canadian
International Development Agency. Several youth groups in the targeted
districts of the West Bank are actively participating in the dialogue,
and the values of peace, dialogue and non-violent communications are
smartly disseminating among these targeted youth groups. This action
will extend to the end of 2005.
4) Empowerment of Youth Clubs in Nablus city :
This
project is developmental and aims at capacity building of the targeted
youth clubs in Nablus city. This project is in line with the main goals
of Ta'awon Association as well as it enhance the youth sector and
facilitates the acceptance of the culture of peace among youth in
Nablus city. During the project the buildings of targeted youth clubs
will be rehabilitated, the clubs will be subsidized with office
equipment and sport instruments. Selected leaders from these clubs will
be trained in Youth mobilization and leadership building.
5) Preparation and qualification of leaders and groups of Young Palestinian students for a civil democratic society
The
project targets 10 West Bank and Gaza high educational enterprises in
Gaza city, Ramallah, Hebron, Nablus, Biet Lehem and East Jerusalem and
aims to promote the spirit of the tolerance and the construction of the
culture of peace within the Palestinian society in general, and
particularly among the Youth. The objective of the project was to
encourage Youth play an active role in society, practice the relative
principles and respect of human rights, justice and equality from the
conviction of the need to always resolve conflicts in a peaceful manner.
This on-going project is targeting 500 students in 10 universities all over the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Workshops
were conducted in Culture of peace and Peaceful conflict resolution
techniques. Leaders from the Palestinian Legislative Council and
political movements were invited to discuss with the Youth the peaceful
struggle.
Results:
Mobilization of 500 Youth volunteers
Qualification
of 500 with democratic and civil society concepts (Volunteerism,
Conflcit resolution, Democracy, Media, Youth & Legislations and
Gender).
Conduction of 48 workshops with different students groups aiming at promoting the role of Youth in the civil society building.
Implementation
of several campaigns to encourage the citizens participation in
Palestinian elections - registration & electing- .
6) Youth peace & democratic coalition project
This
project was targeting university students in Ramallah area and aiming
at enhancement the culture of peace among students and creation of
peaceful climate in the student movement, dissemination of non violent
atmosphere in the university.
During this project many activities
(training, workshops, practical involvement in certain problems with
student movement) were done in order to encourage the peaceful conflict
resolution methods in the students movement,
The results were:
Formation
of a Students Peace Coalition consisting of 50 students (male &
female) for the dissemination of peace and democracy in Palestinian
society in Ramallah.
Conduction of several workshops in Civil society concepts, Culture of peace and Peaceful conflict resolution.
Organization of peaceful demonstration against the WALL,
Start
up of an internet campaign to explore the impacts of the WALL in
Palestinian society, and during that encouraging the use of the
non-violent and peaceful methods for this conflict resolution,
Formation of a coalition of Youth against the Wall from the Peace Coalition members.
7) The Public achievement
This
project was aiming at the experience exchange between the university
students and school students, school students selected the subject of
training and the university students were the trainers. During the
project implementation the selected subjects for the workshops were :
suicidal bombs as a negative method of conflict resolution,
Citizenship, Conflicts in side schools and peaceful resolutions. As a
result of the training the positive conclusions were disseminated to
other school students by the participants, this was a success in
creating a positive directed movement among school students. The whole
aim of the program was to build the capacity of Youth to enable this
sector carry the responsibilities of Youth development.
Results:
Youth
groups from all Hebron and Ramallah targeted different locations were
trained and qualified in the concepts of democracy, citizen's rights
and drama (the total number of qualified Youth is 115 school student).
Youth groups were activated and implemented campaigns aiming at reduction of birth.
Formation of a female artistic popular group in Ramallah girls school.
8) Networking for Peace
Many
activities are implementing continuously by Ta'awon aiming at creation
of real network for peace building in Palestine. Targeted organizations
are civil society organizations working for peace in Palestine, such as
Palestinian Peace Coalition, Haifa Center for Peace and tens of local
non-governmental organizations acting in small communities, villages,
refugee camps and other neighborhoods.
These networking activities are limited with the local level,
Ta'awon
is also active in coordination on regional and international level. On
regional level coordination is made with Jordanian, Turkish and some
Israeli civil society organizations with similar objectives, on
international level Ta'awon succeeded in mobilization of about 20 civil
society youth organizations from Spain, Italy, Holland, Malta and
Latvia to be involved as joint international group in encouraging the
social youth participation in conflict resolution and prevention.
9)
And many other actions related to volunteers mobilization and our
active participation in all Youth conferences in the country and
abroad. Organization of campaigns aiming at advocacy youth issues in
Palestine. Publication of non periodic newspaper concerning the issues
of Peace and Youth. We also organize Youth exchange in Conflict
Resolution issues for groups regional and international.
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ADVICE: What advice would you like to
give to the Secretary-General and the General Assembly to promote a
culture of peace and nonviolence during the second half of the Decade? |
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PARTNERSHIPS: What partnerships and
networks does your organization participate in, thus strengthening the
global movement for a culture of peace? |
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PLANS: What new engagements are
planned by your organization to promote a culture of peace and
nonviolence in the second half of the Decade (2005-2010)? |
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Postal address of organization
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P.O. Box 2462
Ramallah - West Bank
Palestine
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E-mail address of organization
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taawon@taawon4youth.org
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Website address of organization
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www.taawon4youth.org
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Highest priority action domain of a culture of peace
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4) PRIORITY DOMAINS OF ACTION
Among all our actions the first priority is:
Education for a culture of peace
And the second priority is:
Democratic participation
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Second priority action domain of a culture of peace
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Highest priority country of action (or international)
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Palestine
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Second priority country of action (or international)
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Middel East
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