CRDC welcomes new Director of Middle East Projects, veteran Palestinian peacebuilder Aziz Abu Sarah
Aziz Abu Sarah is a Palestinian who has spent the last ten years working as a peacebuilding practitioner. Born and raised in Jerusalem, Abu Sarah lost his brother to the conflict when he was just ten years old. As a result of this tragic loss, he joined the Fatah movement where he spent years writing angry articles for their youth magazine. At the age of 18, as a young Palestinian looking to survive in Jerusalem, he determined that he needed to learn Hebrew and signed up for a Hebrew language course (Ulpan). As the only Palestinian in a class of Israels, he had the experience of meeting Jews and Israelis for the first time, not as soldiers, but as human beings with similar interests, hopes, dreams and tragedies. These experiences changed him forever.
Since then, Abu Sarah has been one of the most dedicated and beloved activists in the Palestinian-Israeli peace movement. Most recently he served as the Palestinian chairman for the Bereaved Families Forum in Israel-Palestine, a group of 500 Israeli and Palestinian Bereaved Families who work for peace. He is a co-founder of Al-Tariq, the Palestinian Institute for Democracy and Development, a Palestinian NGO that runs projects in the West Bank on democracy, non-violent education and civic empowerment. Abu Sarah, along with a Jewish Israeli partner, co-hosted “Changing Directions,” a bilingual radio show in Jerusalem, for three years. Broadcasting from the station ‘All Radio for Peace’ they interviewed thousands of Palestinians and Israelis who underwent a significant transformation in their lives from violence or hatred to peace.
Abu Sarah is a seasoned lecturer who has spoken in hundreds of churches, synagogues and mosques on interfaith dialogue and on the role of religion in reconciliation and has addressed countless international organizations and universities, including the European Parliament, Georgetown University, Columbia, Princeton, Brandeis, Yale, and Fordham. Abu Sarah is highly involved in the Israeli-Palestinian peace movement and, as a result of his work, he has been honored to receive the Silver Rose Award from the European Parliament, the Goldberg Prize for Peace in the Middle East from the Institute of International Education, and the Eisenhower Medallion from People to People International. Abu Sarah’s educational background is in Biblical studies.
Since coming to CRDC, Abu Sarah has designed several new projects along with CRDC’s Director Dr. Marc Gopin and Managing Director, Scott Cooper. The projects they have created all fall under the rubric of a larger project, The Arab Jewish Alliance, which seeks to “ facilitate people-to-people relationship transformation to create a critical mass for social change in the Arab-Jewish relationship.”
Some projects include:
- Citizen Diplomacy Tours to Palestine and Israel with a foucs on systematically overlooked local peacebuilding initiatives and honest, equitable small business partnerships between Arabs, Jews, Israelis, Palestinians.
- “Peace Steps: Paths to Positive Change,” a regular audio visual podcast show featuring Abu Sarah, Gopin and other pairs of hosts who come from across enemy lines. Episodes will:
- Focus on the chronically overlooked stories of those individuals and organizations that offer positive and constructive solutions to daily challenges.
- Explore ‘taboo’ topics, analyze current events and offer alternative perspectives on the Middle Eastern Conflict.
If you’re interested in contacting Aziz about guest lecturing or CRDC about more information or getting involved, send an email to crdc@gmu.edu
Aziz is truly one of the finest Palestinian peacebuilders – We at CRDC feel blessed that he decided to join our team.
Women of Syria for Peace and Justice: Hind Kabawat orchestrates unprecedented event with CRDC Director Rabbi/Dr. Marc Gopin at Assad library in Damascus
Below is the actual footage of one of CRDC’s most inspiring acts of citizen diplomacy to date. It was the first public dialogue in Syria on peace in the Middle East in over forty years. Millions of people witnessed history as the amazing event was broadcasted all over major TV outlets throughout the Arab world. It is true testament to what a unique pair of committed peacemakers, Arab and Jewish, can do with perseverance, care and of course a little bit of risk. Watch the encouraging event here. Learn more about it in Dr. Gopin’s new book, To Make the Earth Whole: The Art of Citizen Diplomacy in an Age of Religious Militancy.
Read Marc’s report in Common Ground News here.
