Swiss time 11:56, Sunday
05.05.2002
Peace village throws light on Middle East
conflict
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The village is located between the Israeli
cities of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem (photo:
www.nswas.com)
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| A
small Israeli-Palestinian village between Tel Aviv and
Jerusalem suggests that both sides can live together in
peace. |
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Links
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One
of the first Jewish settlers in the village – founded in 1972
and today known as Neve Shalom (“Village of Peace”) in Hebrew
and Wahat al-Salam in Arabic - was Swiss-born Evi Guggenheim.
“In the beginning the physical conditions were very
hard,” Guggenheim told swissinfo.
“We didn’t have a
road, we didn’t have electricity, and it was really pioneer
work,” she adds.
Daoud Boulos, the Palestinian
director of development at Neve Shalom, says the village’s
primary school is a unique institution in the Middle East.
“It’s the only bi-national, Jewish-Palestinian school,
where they actually go and study together in the same
classroom, taught by two teachers, one Palestinian, one
Israeli,” Boulos explains.
The village is also home to
a “school for peace”, the venue for regular seminars on
conflict resolution which visitors from outside the village
are invited to attend.
“People from both sides meet
here, stay for three days and engage in intensive seminars and
workshops,” says Boulos.
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Internal conflict
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Though Neve Shalom is known as the village of
peace, Guggenheim admits this does not mean it is an entirely
conflict-free zone.
“As soon as two national groups
live together, there will always be conflict,” Guggenheim
says.
“But our way of living together is to try to
resolve any conflict by addressing the problem. And so we
develop a greater sensitivity to the other side. Sometimes
it’s very hurtful, because we have opposite feelings, but the
main thing is that the village belongs to both of us, in an
equal way.”
Some 50 families – an equal number of
Israelis and Palestinians - now live in the village and
hundreds more are on a waiting list to move in if and when
more land becomes available.
“We can only expand to
150,” says Boulos. “That’s our maximum because of land
limitations.”
The village receives limited support
from the Israeli government, but is mostly reliant on
charitable donations. Guggenheim is currently on a two-year
mission around Europe to raise funds for the
village.
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Living on an island
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Members of the community
gather at the village primary school (photo:
www.nswas.com) |
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| “Inside the
village I feel totally free, but outside I’m really an
outcast, someone who is suspected all the time, so it’s really
a refuge for me,” Boulos says.
“I don’t want it to
stay this way, because it’s not nice to live on an island, and
you really want the entire system to be like this,” he adds.
But could the village act as blueprint for peace in
the Middle East as a whole? Boulos believes this is unlikely.
“I think it only works on a village level, because
given the present situation and with all these killings going
on, it’s very difficult to talk about peace, co-existence and
tolerance,” he says.
If the village is shedding any
light on the present conflict, Boulos suggests, it is how both
sides might peacefully coexist in the future.
“The
situation has come to a state where it is totally hopeless and
any talk of peace is a farce these days,” he says.
“I
hope that if the Middle East problem is resolved, then people
will look back and say ‘this place had a
vision’.”
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Model for
coexistence?
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Guggenheim agrees with Boulos that the village
is “ahead of its time”, but believes the model of peaceful
coexistence may one day be copied elsewhere in the region.
“People outside the village say ‘if it’s possible in
Neve Shalom, then it must be possible’, and so we are really a
sign of hope.”
Guggenheim, currently based in Zurich,
says those charged with brokering an Israeli-Palestinian peace
agreement could do worse than look to Switzerland as a model
nation.
“When I passed the parliament building in
Bern,” she says, “I talked to a Swiss-German soldier who spoke
to me in French.”
“I turned to Daoud and said ‘you
know, Switzerland could be a good model for us with its
cantons and different languages’.”
“But I really hope
it won’t take 700 years until we get there.”
by Ramsey
Zarifeh
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04.05.2002 - 16:07
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