You're Invited -- Our Through Others' Eyes Exhibition

We are excited to extend this invitation to our Through Others' Eyes Exhibition on Sunday, July 31 in Teaneck, NJ. This is a wonderful and inspiring opportunity to hear directly from 20 Israeli Arab and Jewish youth themselves about the reality on the ground in Israel and their experiences in Givat Haviva's shared society programming. 

The exhibition will feature photographs the youth have taken together over a year-long program exploring notions of identity, historical experience, community and culture. This year the youth chose to highlight "stereotypes" and many of their photographs reflect this. 

The event is an incredible opportunity to meet Israel's young people working for a better, more hopeful future. We hope to see you there!

Take a sneak peek at the photographs and read more about this year's group here.

Read More

Looking Back at Givat Haviva's Fourth Annual Shared Society Conference

Executive Director, Yaniv Sagee's 

Welcoming Address  

at Givat Haviva's Shared Society Conference

"A week ago, for a moment, it seemed like a ray of light pierced the darkness. The Prime Minister and the leader of the opposition spoke together about a historic opportunity for peace that would justify a partnership between them. By the next day it was clear that the light was from the engine of the train of war and hate... and we got a right wing nationalist government. In the choice between peace and war, between democracy and ethnocracy, in the choice between a politics of fear and a politics of hope, again and again my beloved country chooses the slippery slope that inevitably leads to ruin.

But we have not gathered here today for the sake of anger and wailing. We have gathered here to strengthen the construction, the partnership, the hope, the true light and not the false. We have gathered together because we are connected partners in a society which is marching toward that slippery slope, but we are also working to prevent the crash by creating an alternative.

2,500 years ago, the great Chinese philosopher Confucius said, "When a group of people are marching downhill, the last one is the highest." And we truly are heading downhill, but we are the last, who are in the highest place, which demands responsibility, a clear strategy, precise implementation, belief in our way, and love. Yes, love.

Martin Luther King Jr. said, "Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend." While we in Israel speak with contempt of "lovers of Arabs", or of those who want to create partnership with "the Zoabis".

And I say -- they who speak of Arabs flocking to the polls, and they who are not ready to live in partnership with the Arab citizens of Israel , and they who see love of Arabs as mistaken or a shortcoming -- they are the ones who endanger our future, the future of our shared country, Israel.

And I have a small confession -- I am a lover of Arabs."

- Yaniv Sagee
Executive Director
The Center for Shared Society at Givat Haviva

Read the rest of Yaniv's speech here.

Read More

Hag Pesach Sameach!

Givat Haviva Would Like to Wish All Our Friends and Partners Hag Pesach Sameach!

Passover is also the Spring Festival and the Holiday of Freedom. It carries within it the moral commitment: "In every generation one must see himself as if he had left Egypt".

Every person and every nation must see themselves as coming out of the shackles of enslavement and into redemption and freedom.

At Givat Haviva we work throughout this year, and for all years to come, for the sake of this imperative: to create a shared and equal society where no person or people have to live under the yoke of oppression or inequality.

Today we express our hope that we may live in an Israel where this vision exists -- where there is equality and freedom for all people regardless of gender, race, religion or nationality.

Givat Haviva wishes you all a happy holiday and a spring full of hope and happiness!

Read More

Our Fourth Annual Shared Society Conference

We are pleased to officially announce our Fourth Annual Shared Society Conference in Israel on Tuesday, May 24th!

This year's Fourth Annual Conference theme is "Implications of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict on Common Citizenship for Jews and Arabs in Israel". The Conference will run for the full length of the day (9am-5pm) and will include various panel discussions held in cooperation with partner organizations dealing with the topics of education, employment, municipal cooperation and forms of communication and discourse for a sustainable democracy and shared society in Israel.  The Conference is a wonderful moment where prominent leaders and representatives from civil society, government, and the private sector in Israel and around the world gather in solidarity for Shared Society.

I know it is a rather far journey for many of our supporters, but we hope to share our message with you and illustrate our work on the ground for Shared Society. 

If you can make it, please officially register here, and don't forget to check out this year's agenda here!

Explore this link for more information about this year's Conference and past year's as well.

Read More

Hebrew Language Day at Musmus High School

As part of the " Yihyeh B'seder " (Hebrew Language Enrichment for Arab Schools) program, the Musmus Middle School held a Hebrew Language Day for the whole school. Each class prepared a station of Hebrew language activities in their classroom for the rest of the school to visit and delivered a presentation in Hebrew before an audience of two teachers and two students who then evaluated the production. The classes' topics included tolerance, animals, professions, outer space, food, racism, and famous Islamic scientists and mathematicians. The children also heard presentations in Hebrew from a team of firefighters and an emergency first-aid provider. The school principal, Hassan Mahajne, the Yihyeh B'seder program instructor, Noam Raz, the school's other Hebrew teachers and the rest of the school faculty worked together to make a fun, educational, and inspiring day for the whole school.

More good news for the program came this month, that the Ministry of Education gave the "Yihyeh B'seder: Hebrew Language Enrichment Program" their hoped-for seal of approval in the form of a two-year plan to expand the program nationwide to the Haifa, North, Central, and South regions of Israel, reaching almost all of the Arab junior high schools in the country, and doubling the hours of instruction per class. This will mean an eight-fold increase in the number of students reached by the program over the coming two years. The program staff at Givat Haviva have begun accelerated recruitment of new teachers for the expansion, and production of more pedagogical material is underway.

Read More