Project Summary

"Refusing to Be Enemies" responds to the expressed need of Arab and Jewish women across the country who are seeking to address the growing tensions that exist between their cultures. Their efforts will serve as a model and provide them with skills that can be used as they work on other issues.

About me

I am a founding member of Zeitouna, a filmmaker, a psychotherapist and someone who feels compelled to be engaged in my community. I am 52 years old and have spent my adult life being involved in projects that are collaborative in nature and concerned with the improvement of relationships among people. Most recently, I served on the board of our local retail food cooperative and was a founding member of Michigan Peaceworks, an organization formed after the beginning of the Iraqi War. I consider dialogue to be an underutilized tool that can inform this type of work in a remarkable way. These experiences and life skills demonstrate my ability to work with others to get things done. Our Zeitouna community is composed of 12 women, ages ranging from 32 to 75. Six of them are Arab or Palestinian and six of them are Jewish. Members include a Holocaust survivor whose daughter and her family live in Israel, and four Palestinian immigrants from the West Bank and Haifa. Some are Jews raised in Zionist families. Two of the Jewish women have children living in Israel. They are all deeply rooted in their own communities with many professional and personal affiliations. In the geographic areas where we will work with women to assist them in establishing their own "Refusing to Be Enemies" dialogue groups; we will encourage a balance between Arab and Jewish women and diversity in age. Since they will be the creators of their own groups their make-up will be unique in many other ways.