About Just Vision

Just Vision is a nonprofit organization that informs local and international audiences about under-documented Palestinian and Israeli joint civilian efforts to resolve the conflict nonviolently. Using media and educational tools, we raise awareness in order to encourage civic participation in grassroots peace building.

At Just Vision, we believe in the value of cooperative Palestinian and Israeli efforts to build a sustainable, free and safe future for all, and the importance of media coverage to raise awareness of these courageous endeavors.   We also believe that there is no silver bullet to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict; a lasting solution will require participation from everyone in every sector. Civil society therefore has a significant role to play in catalyzing a diplomatic resolution to the conflict. 

Just Vision researches and documents the range of Palestinian-Israeli non-violent initiatives to end the conflict.  We create multimedia – including documentary film and the Online Network for Peace at www.justvision.org – to highlight Palestinians and Israelis who are adopting strategic methods to end the bloodshed and set the stage for a diplomatic resolution.  We seek to empower peace builders to become more visible, valued and effective in their work; to challenge stereotypes; to encourage participation among Arab, American, Palestinian and Israeli audiences in peace building; and to resource community leaders and organizations so that they can amplify the message of non-violence and civic participation in conflict resolution efforts.

Our goal is to expose Israelis, Palestinians, broader Arab and American audiences to non-violent civic peace builders from both sides of the conflict who are working together to foster understanding and trust.  Through education, we seek to inspire those who are not yet involved to explore and take part in the range of sectors in which conflict resolution work is happening. 

Who We Reach

Just Vision works alongside hundreds of grassroots organizations in North America and the Middle East to provide them with materials about Palestinian and Israeli civic peace builders.  We bring our materials to students, teachers, community and NGO leaders, journalists, university groups and others through community centers and schools, youth movements, the media, the Internet, and film festivals. 

Why Just Vision?

Today’s media provides far more attention to top-down political, military and militant developments than to civilians’ concerns and efforts in resolving the conflict. This creates a skewed perception of the region and the people living in it. The focus on politicians creates the erroneous impression – not only among Israelis and Palestinians, but among the world at large - that only politicians have a role to play. 

Just Vision’s multi-media programs seek to fill in the gap left by the mainstream broadcasters and journalists by documenting and disseminating the stories of crucial peace building initiatives happening on the ground. In so doing, we provide Israeli, Palestinian and American educators and community leaders with non-partisan digital, educational resources to teach about this conflict in constructive, responsible and compelling ways. 

Our materials offer insight into perspectives from the two sides and create connection, understanding, empathy and hope – critical elements to the long-term implementation of or adherence to any diplomatic process. In recognition of our approach, we received a letter of support from the Israeli Ministry of Education for our Classroom Screening Guide and documentary film.

Fulfilling Our Mission
 
Documentary Film - Just Vision released an award-winning feature documentary, Encounter Point, in April 2006 as a response to the lack of media coverage about civilian joint efforts in the region. The film follows the stories of a handful of ordinary Palestinian and Israeli civilians who overcame personal tragedies and grief and endured the harshest consequences of the conflict yet chose to partner with their supposed enemies in order to resolve the conflict non-violently. At the time of its release, no documentary effectively showcased adults who dared to behave in humane, empathic and thoughtful ways, and who expressed a desire to resolve the conflict through diplomacy rather than militarism and militancy. The film has opened hundreds of doors to the film subjects, empowering them to reach audiences worldwide, and to spread their message. Encounter Point premiered to sold-out audiences at the Tribeca Film Festival.  Since then, it has won numerous awards and was hailed by Variety as a "Concise, intelligent documentary... that deftly avoids schmaltz in its delineation of grief and its celebration of cross-cultural activism." Encounter Point has received rave reviews in the Jerusalem Post, the Village Voice, TimeOut NY, the New York Times, LA Weekly and more.

Encounter Point twice won the Audience Award for Best Documentary -- at the Rencontres Film Festival in Montreal and at the San Francisco International Film Festival.  In addition, it received the Docupolis Award for Best first Documentary in Barcelona, the Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary at the Sao Paulo Jewish Film Festival, and was an Official Selection at the Dubai International Film Festival and the Al Jazeera Documentary Film Festival.  It was the winner of the Best Musical Score award at the Bend Film Festival in 2006.  In 2007, after screening in every Israeli Cinematheque movie theater, the film also appeared on CBC in Canada, and excerpts were shown on Al Jazeera and on Israeli Television.  Encounter Point was broadcast to millions of viewers in its entirety on Al Arabyia, one of the world’s largest Arabic satellite TV stations, with a viewership of 130 million. In total, the film has screened in 150 cities worldwide to more than 10,000 theatergoers.

In the US, American Arabs, Jews, Muslims and Christians are uniting in support of Encounter Point. They are reaching out to local mosques, synagogues, churches, temples, colleges, high schools and community groups to show the film, to discuss its themes, to learn about grassroots peace building and to get more involved.

The Online Network for Peace - The Online Network for Peace (at www.justvision.org) is the most in-depth online educational resource highlighting civilians who are working to stem hatred, promote reconciliation, understanding and nonviolence among diverse constituencies in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Their stories provide unique insight into a conflict that dominates our headlines but for the most part remains poorly understood.  Please visit the Portraits Section and Timeline as there is no other resource featuring such a broad spectrum of change makers in the Middle East.

Our interviewees are of various religious, political, sociological and regional backgrounds. Their views on history, politics and the prospects for peace differ greatly. Since any future attempt at bridging the divides among Israelis and Palestinians -- and by extension Jewish and Arab communities -- even among peace workers, will require an understanding of these differences, we hope that our research provides a useful starting point. New first-hand interviews are footnoted, fact checked and published every few weeks. These can be cross referenced according to thematic highlights, such as “Civil Society,” “Coming Together,” “Community Responses” “Education,” “Fear,” “Final Status Issues,” “Freedom of Movement,” “Holocaust,” etc.

Engaging Persons of Influence and the Media - Just Vision has been reaching out to people with the power to make a difference on this issue quickly. From a former Israeli Chief of Intelligence to the leaders of the Fatah Movement, from a representative to the House Subcommittee on the Middle East to the royal family in Jordan, Just Vision is working to reach individuals from across the political spectrum and the globe to lend their public support to nonviolent civilian-led peace movements. We have brought our work to the United Nations and the World Bank but there is much more to be done.

Just Vision conducts extensive outreach to Israeli, Arab and American journalists to encourage them to report on nonviolent approaches to resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. From NPR to Al Jazeera, Just Vision has succeeded in getting Palestinian and Israeli nonviolent civic peace builders onto the airwaves to promote their efforts and their views. In April 2005, we were featured on Oprah.com and on The Oprah Winfrey Show to express our desire for more coverage of peace builders. Our work has received attention from outlets ranging from the New York Times to Al Arabiya to the Jerusalem Post.

New Directions in Raising Awareness about Civic Peace-builders

Just Vision is now creating a series of short films exploring the opportunities and obstacles facing Palestinian and Israeli civic leaders who challenge cultures of militancy and work to build a non-violent grassroots movement to end the conflict. The films, ranging in length from 3 to 30 minutes, will focus on issues such as the role of the private sector, environmentalists, educators, religious figures and leaders in non-violence. The short films will be character-driven.

Our overarching goal is to expose audiences to a growing movement to end the conflict that is happening in real time among Palestinians and Israelis, thus debunking the myth that “there is no partner for peace.”  By creating a picture of the difficulties these movements face – without shying away from its self-inflicted shortcomings – our aim is to create a sense of agency and possibility among audiences by demonstrating that civilian-led initiatives and pressure have led to small but significant victories on the ground, and to offer hope that change is possible in the direction of peace.

We will continue to facilitate use of the film series and related materials among Israeli and Palestinian youth in classrooms, community groups, after school programs. Finally, we will resource up NGOs by providing them with Just Vision’s materials for their education and outreach work.

Organizational History and Capacity

Just Vision was launched in 2003, after two years of intensive research. We consulted 475 Israeli and Palestinian leaders in non-violence and peace building to learn about their work, their successes, failures and lessons learned

We are the first organization to effectively engage Israeli, American and broader Arab media simultaneously with the same content. Just Vision acts as a platform or hub, linking non-violent grassroots peace workers to one another and to broader networks of support using digital media and strategic outreach.  This approach of treating all non-violent peace initiatives as part of a broader whole, and encouraging audiences to regard them as such sets us apart.  We also have the most comprehensive database (now in three languages - Arabic, Hebrew, and English) of non-violent Israeli and Palestinian peace builders.

Just Vision uses media to deliver its message precisely because it is scalable. We are developing facilitator training models for community leaders in the US and Israeli and Palestinian teachers and community leaders to ensure that our materials are incorporated into local programming. We are also forging strategic partnerships to widen our reach. For instance, one of the largest Israeli youth movements presented our materials to 180 of their leader/facilitators, who in turn pledged to take them back to their local community groups and integrate them into local programming on the issue of civic participation in conflict resolution. 

How You Can Help

Just Vision has grown since its inception in 2003 thanks to the generosity of hundreds of individual donors and small family foundations.  Tax-deductible contributions can be made to Just Vision Inc. and sent to:  Just Vision, PMB #226 123 Seventh Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11215. For further information or to lend your support, contact info@justvision.org.

Thank you for your interest in Just Vision.

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