The Jewish–Muslim Women's Leadership Initiative: A Program for Peaceful Dialogue

• In Event: 16.050 - The Global Culture of Peace

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is present findings of, and share insight from, a program that brought together Jewish and Muslim undergraduate women to explore the possibility for peace in the midst of the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Specifically, the participants in the Women’s Leadership Initiative (WLI) learned about (a) the multiple perspectives on the history between Israel and Palestine, (b) commonly used conflict resolution techniques, (c) the impact of social media on the Middle East peace process, and (d) women’s potential for leadership in peacebuilding. The authors of this paper were all WLI facilitators and, through this presentation, hope to share the successes, challenges, and potentials for future research and programming that were discovered as a result of this program.

Authors

• Jing Lin, University of Maryland - College Park

• Sachi Edwards, University of Maryland

• Sahar Khamis