From the Ha’aretz Oct 2016 supplement “Israel at the Cutting Edge” Leaders//Innovation Talk SOCIAL ACTION / Yaniv Sagee Innovation can mean – and must mean – casting aside paradigms that are no longer relevant. For us, at Givat Haviva, it has meant changing the way we view shared life between Jews and Arabs in Israel. Founded in 1949 by the kibbutz federation, Givat Haviva was and remains the pioneering organization tasked with promoting what we used to call “coexistence” in Israel. If coexistence was the goal, dialogue was the means of bringing about change. The theory was simple: In a state in which Jews and Arabs live in separate communities and attend separate schools, we must bring them together for joint encounters in which they can get to know one another and develop a basis for good relations. In October 2000, with the outbreak of the second intifada, that premise of coexistence crumbled – as Israeli Arabs identified with their people, the Palestinians.
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The Center for a Shared Society at Givat Haviva