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Women Wage Peace (WWP)
In early March, in honor of International Women’s Day, we featured Women Wage Peace (Nashim Osot Shalom). Founded in 2014, following that summer’s Gaza war, it boasts 40,000 members and has quickly become the largest grassroots movement in Israel seeking a negotiated resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The movement is proudly unaffiliated with any political party because WWP leaders believe that, to achieve peace, the issue mustn’t be monopolized by any one particular group. So its membership is diverse: Women from the Israeli right, center, and left; religious and secular; Jews, Arabs, Druze, and Bedouin; women from the center of the country and from outlying areas. Its activities include parlor meetings, roadside rallies, and mass marches. WWP is also lobbying the Knesset to pass a “Political Alternatives First” law, which would oblige the Cabinet to formally allocate time for discussing political alternatives to war and would earmark budgetary resources for developing such alternatives. Learn more at their website.
Other Voice
In late March, with tensions between Israel and Hamas again running high, and amid a growing chorus of voices in Israel calling for another war in Gaza, we featured the Sderot-based peace organization, Other Voice. Founded in 2008, Other Voice (Kol Acher) is a grassroots volunteer movement including both Israelis from communities near the Gaza Strip as well as Palestinians from the Strip. Members seek to end the cycle of violence, and they work together to build good neighborly relationships and dialogue between those on opposite sides of the border fence. Other Voice engages in a variety of activities, including public protests, seminars, petitions, and op-ed writing, all aimed at raising awareness among Israelis and Palestinians and the international community as to the high toll – physical and psychological – that the violence is exacting from both sides. The movement stresses the need to achieve a non-violent, long-term political solution to the conflict. Learn more at our website
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