Class of Fall 2016 “Peace, Justice and Conflict Resolution Studies In the West Bank”, Palestine — LIMITE : 01/06/2016

Hello and thank you for your interest in studying PJCR in the West Bank. Please find below the details of our program and don’t hesitate to contact us with any questions. We are looking forward to welcoming you to Palestine!

Peace in Palestine or a two-state solution has become an agenda for the world, but why hasn’t it happened? This program looks at the intricate balances between politics and religion, culture, economics, and human rights with field studies on peace, justice, and conflict resolution in a developing land that cannot yet call itself a state. Although this program is located in the West Bank of Palestine, it will take a look at the many perspectives of the occupation of the Palestinian territories.

The West Bank will become a living classroom as students engage inside and outside the classroom sharing their ideas, traveling to important parts of the country; visiting historically significant sites, refugee camps, villages, holy sites, and more. Students will also have the opportunity to create a positive impact in their new host community through a variety of volunteer activities related to social development, agriculture, and environmental protection.

Duration

A semester

Courses

Arabic Language Study (5 credits)

An-Najah’s Arabic for Non-Natives Program: http://learnarabic.najah.edu/

All levels available. No previous language study required.

**If a student has a high proficiency in Arabic they may choose a course within the university in lieu of studying Arabic.

Conflict Resolution (3 credits)

The objective of this course is to provide an understanding of conflict in terms of its deep causes, manifestations, and its types. It introduces conflict resolution theories and explains how each theory defines the core concepts of “power”, “peace”, “violence”, “justice” and “conflict” within, and the role of each in conflict duration and particulars. It also aims to analyze how conflicts are perceived from different viewpoints and how perceptions play a major role in prospects toward resolution. This course will provide students with approaches, methods, and skills in conflict management, negotiation, and resolution using Palestine-Israel as a living classroom. Guest lectures will include local experts.

Palestine: Peace and Justice, Not Separation (3 credits)

This course will introduce students to the major issues (e.g. identity, justice, grievances, domination, and exclusion) concerning Palestine-Israel and the building of a region of stability and inclusion. Students will come to understand the obstacles towards nation building through the study of intertwined Palestinian, Israeli and international ideologies, politics, laws, and religions along with their affects on the economy, human rights, natural resources, movement, development, culture, security and more. This course also examines the debate on the two-state vs. one-state resolution and their potentialities to resolve the core issues of the conflict and why.

Field Studies Course (4 Credits)

This will be a series of field excursions where students experience firsthand what they have learned from their lecture classes. Students will be expected to keep field notes and video, report, draw, etc. their experiences. Field excursions include but are not limited to: Balata and Ascar Refugee Camps, a former detention camp that is now a youth center, the Old City of Nablus (some parts date back to the Ottoman and Byzantine Empires), Hebron, Haifa, the Golan Heights (including The Shouting Valley), the Negav Desert to spend a day with a Bedouin tribe, Akka, Nazareth, Haifa, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Ramallah, a Samaritan village, Freedom Theater, a weekend with a host family, the first “planned” city in Palestine, and more.

Students will also visit the Dead Sea, a Turkish bath, participate in the Annual Olive Harvest, ride a camel, and experience traditional Dubka, folkloric dancing, and more.

Field Studies and Other Educational Excursions have been planned by An-Najah National University’s Zajel Youth Exchange Program, which has had over 14 years of experience planning intercultural exchanges and study visits. http://youth.zajel.org/default.asp

Program Dates: Fall 2016

• Program Start Date: Aug 16, 2016 (Estimated) Program End Date: Dec 13, 2016 (Estimated)
• The program dates are subject to change. Please note that traveling to Nablus may take more than one day.
• Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis.

Application Deadline: June 1, 2016

Tuition: $6,399

The tuition fee covers the following program components:

• Cost of all classes, including Arabic Language Program.
• Health insurance throughout the entire program.
• Cell phone with sim card.
• All accommodations during the program. This includes your time at An-Najah and on all excursions.
• All meals on excursions.
• Visa expenses
• Onsite Orientation

Eligibility

Open to undergraduate and master’s students who are currently enrolled in Middle Eastern studies, peace and conflict resolution, international relations, or comparative politics courses. And to those who have a genuine interest in learning more about the Middle East and Palestine-Israel.

How to Apply

The online application is accessible here: http://goo.gl/forms/L5OwosxCL9

Please contact us with any questions at pjcrprogram@gmail.com or paige.w@najah.edu Location:

Location

An-Najah National University, Nablus, West Bank, Palestine

Contact Information

Paige.w@najah.edu or pjcrprogram@gmail.com

Tel: 00 972 2 2413077

Fax: 00 972 2 2413271

Faculty:

Dr. Hasan Ayoub, Academic Director

Dr. Hasan S. Ayoub, a Palestinian National, holds a PhD (received in 2012) in International Politics and Comparative Politics from the University of Denver’s Joseph Korbel School of International Studies. He is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at An-Najah National University and teaches courses on Political Planning and Development, Political Sociology and Change, American Foreign Policy in the Middle East and an Introduction to International Political Theory on the undergraduate and graduate levels. He is the former Director for the P.L.O. Office’s National Bureau for the Protection of Land and Resistance to Settlements, has been a consultant and public elections coordinator for the Palestinian Presidential Elections, the keynote speaker at the Annual Human Rights Arab Conference and has spoken on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in Europe and the United States. He is fluent in Arabic, English and Hebrew.

Alaa Abu Dheer, Field Studies Coordinator

Mr. Abu Dheer holds a Master’s (2001) in Contemporary Arabic Studies from Birzeit University and a Bachelor’s (1992) in Philosophy from Damascus University. He has been a public relations practitioner for fourteen years, during which he founded the International Youth Exchange Program (Zajel) at the Public Relations Department of An-Najah National University in 2001. His ultimate goal through founding Zajel was to change the stereotypical image of the Palestinian cause by raising awareness through cultural exchange programs organized with Palestinian students. He has written several books related to the formation of stereotypes and mental images such as: Al- Aqsa Intifada’s Image in Western Caricature: American Perspective (2002), Iraq’s Image in the American Caricature: American Perspective (2003), Hizbullah’s Image in the American Caricature: American Perspective (2006). He also holds special interests in Palestinian oral history which is reflected in his Nakba Eyewitnesses book, which was published in Arabic, English and Turkish.

About the City of Nablus

Nablus (sometimes called Nābulus) is a Palestinian city in the northern West Bank, approximately 63 kilometers (39 mi) north of Jerusalem, with a population of 134,000. Located in a strategic position between Mount Ebal and Mount Gerizim, it is the capital of the Nablus Governorate and a Palestinian commercial and cultural center. Founded by the Roman Emperor Vespasian in 72 CE as Flavia Neapolis, Nablus has been ruled by many empires over the course of its almost 2,000 year long history. In the 5th and 6th centuries, conflict between the city’s Christian and Samaritan inhabitants climaxed in a series of Samaritan revolts against Byzantine rule, before their violent quarelling in 529 CE drastically reduced the number of communities in the city. In 636, Neapolis, along with most of Palestine, came under the rule of the Islamic Arab Caliphate of Umar ibn al-Khattab; its name Arabicized to Nablus, and many of its churches and Samaritan synagogues gradually converted into mosques. In 1099, the Crusaders took control of the city for less than a century, leaving its mixed Muslim, Christian and Samaritan population relatively undisturbed. After Saladin’s Ayyubid forces took control of the interior of Palestine in 1187, Islamic rule was reestablished, and continued under the Mamluk and Ottoman empires to follow.

Following its incorporation into the Ottoman empire in 1517, Nablus was designated capital of the Jabal Nablus (“Mount Nablus”) district. In 1657, after a series of upheavals, a number of Arab clans from the northern and eastern Levant were dispatched to the city to reassert Ottoman authority. Loyalty from amongst these clans staved off challenges to the empire’s authority from rival regional leaders such as Dhaher al-Omar in the 18th century and Muhammad Ali—who briefly ruled Nablus—in the 19th century.

When Ottoman rule was firmly reestablished in 1841, Nablus prospered as a center of trade. After the loss of the city to British forces during World War I, Nablus was incorporated into the British Mandate of Palestine in 1922, and later designated to form part of the Arab state of Palestine under the 1947 UN partition plan.

The end of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War saw the city instead fall to Jordan, to which it was unilaterally annexed, until its occupation by Israel during the 1967 Six Day War. Today, the city’s population is predominantly Muslim, with small Christian and Samaritan minorities.

Since 1995, day-to-day administration is the purview of the Palestinian National Authority, though Israel retains control over entrances and exits to the city. There are three Palestinian refugee camps located around Nablus, established in 1949–50. In the Old City, there are a number of significant archaeological sites spanning the fist to 15th centuries. Regionally famous for its native sweet kanafeh and traditionally well-known for its soap industry, Nablus’ main economic sectors are in industry and commerce.

Source: http://nablusguide.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=55%3Anablus-shechem-introduction&catid=39%3Ahistory&Itemid=60&lang=en 

For more information on Palestine, please visit: http://www.visitpalestine.ps/

 

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