A yearly summer camp that brings together 10 Jewish and 10 Palestinian Israeli youth for three and a half weeks to engage in recreational activities and to talk about identity, history, and power.

Problems and Purpose

The Heart to Heart summer camp program was developed as a way to break down barriers and change the conversation between young Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel. Through humanizing activities and peer-education the camp aims to open participants up to different perspectives, to help them understand the importance of building a shared society, and to equip them with the relationships and skills needed to make it a reality.^[1] The educational goals of the program are:

Critical thinking and reflection
Group-building, communication, and teamwork
Adaptability, autonomy, and resiliency
Achieving a balance between hope and realistic expectations^[2]

Background History and Context

Heart to Heart was founded in response to the structural inequity and racism in Israeli society.^[3] Now in its fifth decade, the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory has fomented an undercurrent of violence and human rights abuses that affect citizens on both sides of the conflict.^[4] Both sides claim rights to the territory and continued violence and mistrust between the two has so far stymied any attempts at a peaceful resolution.^[5][6]

Organizing, Supporting, and Funding Entities

Heart to Heart is a joint program of the non-profit Givat Haviva in Israel and Camp Shomria, run by Hashomer Hatzair, in Canada. Givat Haviva - The Center for a Shared Society - runs a number of educational and participatory programs with the goal of bridging divided communities and spurring collective action toward a sustainable Israeli democracy based on mutual responsibility, civic equality, and shared goals.^[7] The Heart to Heart summer camp was created by Jenny Isaacs as an extension of Givat Haviva’s two-year Children Teaching Children school-based program.^[8] For its part, Camp Shomria is run by Hashomer Hatzair, a leader in the Zionist movement but the only party to advocate for Arab equality and a binational state in Palestine during the creation of Israel.^[9] Camp Shomria is located halfway between Toronto and Montreal, and describes itself as “the only truly youth-led summer camp in North America, where young people live an immersive communal lifestyle and develop their identities as activists and Jews.”^[10]

Participant Recruitment and Selection

Each year, Heart to Heart selects 20 youth aged 14-15 - half Palestinian citizens of Israel and half Jewish citizens of Israel - from the graduates of Givat Haviva's two-year Children Teaching Children school-based program.^[11] Many of the participants live within minutes of each other in Israel; however, because of the deep divisions and political restrictions, they often do not have the opportunity or ability to speak to one another.^[12]

Methods and Tools Used

The Heart to Heart camp uses a variety of alternative and participatory educational tools and techniques to achieve its four educational goals:

Critical thinking and reflection
Group-building, communication, and teamwork
Adaptability, autonomy, and resiliency
Achieving a balance between hope and realistic expectations

Activities include facilitated deliberation, relationship- and trust-building activities, peer-led sessions, and communication and listening. Participants also spend four days living with Canadian host families and touring the Greater Toronto Area. Educational programming is provided before and after the two-week trip, and participants are required to implement the ‘take it home’ project they create during camp. The yearly conference allows alumni to continue friendships built at the camp and to share knowledge and stories of their work back home.^[13]

What Went On: Process, Interaction, and Participation

The Heart to Heart summer program is an immersive three-and-a-half-week camp. Participants live and eat together, and engage in a number of recreational and educational activities such as intramurals, swimming, arts and crafts, games, hiking, and canoeing trips. These are all done with a focus on building relationships and an understanding between Jewish and Palestinians in the context of historical and ongoing tensions and conflict. Participants also spend four days living with Canadian host families, tour Toronto and the surrounding region, and visit to Parliament Hill in Ottawa.

Camp counselor Judah Kauffman describes one participatory art project clearly informed by a number of the camp’s goals:

“In one activity, the staff divided everyone into their respective identity groups. Each had to write out the historical timeline of the other identity group: the Jews write out the Palestinian timeline, and the Palestinians write out the Jewish timeline. The Palestinian participants notched their timeline every few centimeters. The Jewish participants had more trouble.

When the timelines lay beside each other, the Palestinians explained that they knew so much because Jewish-Israeli history is what they learn in school. It's what's in the standard textbooks. Everything the Palestinians know about their own history was handed down to them from parents and grandparents.”^[15]

Another activity requires participants to work in groups of two - one Jewish, one Palestinian - to create a new constitution for the state of Israel.^[16]

As participants in the Givat Haviva’s Children Teaching Children program, campers are also involved in educational programming in Israel before and after the three-week trip. Part of the summer camp involves creating a 'taking it home' project so that participants can take action with what they have learned at the camp when back in their own communities. Givat Haviva also hosts a yearly conference for camp alumni which allows them to renew and maintain connections and share what they have learned and achieved since the program.^[17]

Influence, Outcomes, and Effects

The Heart to Heart program is intended to have the following outcomes:

1) Critical thinking and reflection: participants question their own assumptions and biases, the sources of their information, and the structures and systems that shape their beliefs. Group activities allow participants to build, process, and share their narratives with the ‘other side.’

2) Group-building, communication, and teamwork: participants forge strong bonds and work together as an ‘established unit’ with a unique, but shared, identity. Activities develop teamwork skills, build trust and respect, and communicate the power of a unified group in the face of adversity. Participants are taught to express themselves openly and to listen actively - even while disagreeing with what they hear - so that they can return home with confidence in their own voice and perspective, and with an appreciation and respect for those of others.

3) Adaptability, autonomy, and resiliency: activities designed to build confidence in one’s own strength, resiliency, and ability to adapt to new places, cultures, and experiences. Participants are encouraged to go outside of their comfort zones and to navigate their way in a foreign place thereby gaining independence and self-assurance.

4) Achieve a balance between hope and realistic expectations: camp is fun and easy compared to many realities at home. Participants develop actionable plans that will enable them to continue the conversation when they return. Camp activities impart the obligation and duty each participant has to take action at whatever level of society makes sense for them. The camp is designed to leave participants feeling empowered by the experience, but also informed and well-prepared for the reality of the situation they are returning to.^[18]

Analysis and Lessons Learned

According to participant surveys, the program has effectively achieved many of the goals centered on the individual, such as building relationships and changing negative or harmful biases and perceptions of ‘the other.’^[19] However, the camp’s goals around continued action and societal change have not always been achieved. According to CBC reporter Judah Kauffman, Asaf Nahama appreciated the new perspectives he gained through the camp, but found that taking action on “love and peace and [not] hate and war” back home was unrealistic. Camp director Jenny Isaacs takes this feedback as a learning point for the program, pointing out that Nahama does not say that his aspirations were wrong or unworthy, but unrealistic: “I hear this and I feel even more motivated to continue expanding the supports we are able to offer Asaf and his peers when they go home. Striking the balance of hope and realistic expectations is key to social change." Mr Kauffman, himself a former camp counselor, ends his report on a similarly positive note: “Going forward, I can't be certain how much [campers] Mohamed Agbariya, Asaf Nehama, or their friends will talk. But after the journey they went through at Heart to Heart, I think they'll always be open to listening.”^[20]