Nivine Sandouka is a Palestinian lifelong human rights activist and feminist, and is the current regional director of ALLMEP Alliance for Middle East Peace, a network of 170 organizations in various ways committed to building peace and a future of reconciliation.She previously worked with AGIAMONDO (German Association for Development Cooperation), Oxfam, CARE International, IPCRI, and ROPES (Regional Organization for Peace, Economy, and Security).She also runs an online initiative called “Judi- from me to you” that connects women and volunteers from different civil society organizations, and is on the board of a newly established NGO called “Our Rights-Hoqoqona,” which works on the civil and political rights of Palestinians, particularly women, in East Jerusalem.She is a member of the board of directors of the “Jerusalem Center for Women” and has participated in numerous conferences, including J Streetand Cannan Projectin Berlin.
We reached Nivine over the phone in East Jerusalem where she lives, and this is what she told us.
I was born during the first uprising in the 1980s. My grandfather was the Mukthar, the person who solves problems within our community. At that time it was difficult for women to study, become doctors or teachers and yet my mother, my aunts and all the women around me were educated and very much involved: our family was highly educated. But I don’t have happy memories of my childhood. I still remember the Israeli soldiers storming into our school and all of us little girls hiding under our desks. Even drawing the Palestinian flag was forbidden, so we hid it between the pages of our textbooks. A situation very similar to the current one, violence everywhere. I remember a neighbor being killed in the courtyard behind our house in the Sha’fat neighborhood where we lived. The “other” was the enemy, and we were resisting…
The Al-Aqsa Mosque was a special place where we could all meet, Palestinians from the West Bank and also from Gaza and of course from all over Jerusalem. Every Friday, it was packed with people both inside and outside: it was a place where we felt safe. Then that important thing happened, the Oslo Agreement, the first glimpse of hope for my generation. Seeing the leaders of the two enemy sides meet, shake hands, lay down weapons, and sign the peace agreement was an unforgettable moment for every Palestinian and Israeli who experienced it.
The same streets where we had fought were now full of people, happy to greet each other and exchange sweets, groceries, flowers, even with the Israelis, things like that. Peace was the main news on Israeli TV channels and it was during that period that I decided to learn Hebrew. And then there were visits to Eilat, Tel Aviv, places normally inaccessible because of the conflict, even the West Bank had suddenly become a safe place: entering Ramallah, Bethlehem, and then Nablus, Jericho, everything was extraordinary, even the Palestinian police, confirmation of our existence as an authority, a recognition of our identity.
It was a moment that shaped my personality and what I do today. Unfortunately the agreements did not last, as we know. Suicide attacks resumed soon after, culminating in the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin by Israeli nationalist extremists, the same people who are in power today. Then came the construction of the wall and that meant apartheid and the confiscation of more land, the increase in settlements: the second intifada in full swing.
At that time I was studying at Bethlehem University and the same road that would normally take me 30 minutes suddenly took two or three hours, with checkpoints everywhere, every single car being checked by Israeli soldiers, who demanded ID before allowing entry into the city. I particularly remember one of them, perhaps a general, who had a photo of a young man around his neck. “He’s my son, killed in a suicide bombing,” he said in response to my questioning look, while his gun was pointed at me.
It was at that moment that I understood with total clarity: we are all victims, we must find a way to break this spiral of violence. In the years that followed I worked in various development agencies, particularly in the West Bank and also in Gaza. And I came to the conclusion that even when you manage to provide the best tools for growth, to map out the best possible path for the future, even when you invest your time and energy and all those dollars so that the Palestinian society could take a step forward, the occupation is there, with checkpoints everywhere to block any kind of step forward. And the nights will remain terrible for some villages, with soldiers searching houses and children terrified. And the days will be an endless story of destroyed water wells, land taken away for settlements, and no matter how hard you try to improve the political situation, it will remain the same. Clearly in order to break this vicious circle the occupation must end: change must happen at the political level for anything to change.
I think it was in 2015 when I decided to go into politics, even though I am a woman: being a woman and being involved in politics is not very accepted in this part of the world, because in order to make your voice heard you have to spend a lot of time away from home, which means questioning the traditional role assigned to women. The second obstacle is that I am from Jerusalem, which means that I have Israeli residency but not citizenship, and as a Palestinian political activist I risk losing my residency or ending up in prison. And for the “narrative” that I represent as a Palestinian, I can’t either engage in politics as an Israeli, contribute in any way to change from within the system.
So the only field where I can make a difference is at the level of civil society, by joining our formidable “peace camp”: it is there that, while preserving my narrative, I can gradually engage with “the other side” and imagine a shared vision for the future of our peoples. This is how I gained a better understanding of Israelis, often mirroring in their aspirations my own hopes as a Palestinian: the need not only for security but also safety on both sides of the conflict, the need for recognition and self-determination for all.
(…) I worked with various agencies until, three years ago, I joined the board of directors of ALLMEP, where I am now Regional Director. We are talking about an alliance of 170 organizations, all expressions of civil society and committed to the same goal of “peacebuilding”. They may have different approaches and levels of visibility – some work in advocacy, others at the grassroots level, many with joint Israeli-Palestinian affiliations – but they are all united toward the same goal. As ALLMEP’s regional representative I feel honoured to be part of this project, which allows us to amplify the voices, practices and achievements of all these organizations that are so often ignored. And I firmly believe that all of this would deserve the utmost support from the international community.
Just a few words about ALLMEP: it was founded in 2006 and is based in Washington with affiliates throughout the Middle East and representatives in Europe as well. Its founder, the American Jew Avi Meyerstein, had visited our area on several occasions, meeting with organizations that he believed were doing an important work at the level of civil society – but the situation was so dire and the need for support was so evident.
From the outset Avi’s idea was to network the efforts of these organizations so that their voices could be better heard as a unified force, rather than individually and with little result. When people come together, their voices are amplified and others join in, and that is how we all become stronger: this was Avi’s idea. It was a project that sought to replicate the experience of the International Fund for Northern Ireland, which in 1986 contributed relevantly to the peace process with the support of the international community. The idea was that a similar “investment” could be envisaged for our area as well, with an International Fund for Peace in Israel and Palestine, a goal we have pursued throughout these years, with uncertain results.
Just to give you an example: while in Northern Ireland the annual per capita investment to support the reconciliation process was US$44, in our conflict the investment has always been less than US$4 per capita per year. If you talk to people in Northern Ireland, they will tell you how civil society has been the glue in the process of bringing the different sides together, through the creation of platforms for dialogue, where they could recognize themselves within a framework of shared humanity and imagine a possible future together. And if this has happened in the troubled Northern Ireland, why shouldn’t it happen here?
Unfortunately, we still don’t have such a fund. For a moment, we thought we had made it when ALLMEP received the MEPPA (Middle East Partnership for Peace Act) Award, a $250 million grant to be shared among all our 170 organizations, but everything is now on hold after the Trump administration cut USAID funding. On top of that, a new tax proposal has been foreseen by the Israeli government that would tax all foreign funding for organizations like ours at up to 80% of the amount! This will be a serious blow to all these communities working to protect human rights and promote dialogue between Palestinians and Israelis.
That is why we believe it is more important than ever to amplify their voices: since October 7th, we have not stopped talking to the media, calling for a ceasefire and the release of hostages, calling for the protection of civilians on both sides and asking the international community to promote a process that can contribute to a political solution. A solution that our leaders are evidently unable to achieve, while there are so many excellent proposals coming from civil society, from the Land for All campaign to the Confederal Model, to the ‘classic’ Two-State Proposal, all of which require the involvement and participation of civil society, and this is what we are trying to amplify.
(…) A small success in this regard was achieved last year during the G7 summit held in Puglia under the Italian presidency: with the recognition of the role of civil society in any future political process concerning this area… we hope to see some follow-up. We certainly need more concrete action from the international community in this direction: think of the money that has been invested in all the weapons, warplanes and bombs that have been dropped on Gaza, compared to the money that could have been invested in projects of development and reconciliation. Peace is always so much more convenient than war…
And all these issues will be discussed during the two days of the People’s Peace Summit in Jerusalem on May 8 and 9, an event that represents the evolution of the previous summit held in Tel Aviv on July 1st, which, as a woman and as a Palestinian, filled my heart with hope! It was such an emotional moment of collective healing for many of us, Israelis and Palestinians, who not only confronted our shared narratives, but were also able to imagine all sort of courageous steps towards peace. It was such a wide-ranging event, so rich and significant for the presence of writers, politicians, public figures, as well as women and men, young and old, Arabs, Israelis, Palestinians – so many of us were there!
This second summit will be even more important, first of all because it will take place over two consecutive days. The first day will feature many activities, seminars, workshops and musical performances that will take place inside cultural venues, galleries and bookstores throughout the city, including East Jerusalem, because, as we know, Jerusalem itself is a problem, divided between East and West. There will therefore be activities on both sides, with dozens of civil society organizations hosting different events at the same time.
On the second day, all these issues will be represented in a conference center and a group of diplomats will be present as well to report the conclusions to their governments. The main message, aimed primarily at the Israeli public but not only, will be: there isanother way and it is time. It’s time to stop the war, not only by bringing home the hostages, but by opening up to a different political horizon and serious long-term negotiations, because we all deserve a better future than the current one, in which we are all traumatized, deeply wounded as human beings.
It will therefore be a truly extraordinary summit, where the various proposals coming from civil society will be taken into consideration at a political level and in front of the widest possible audience of Israelis and Palestinians as well, who will be able to participate via videoconference, in case they they will not be allowed to be present in person. There are chances (this is still in negotiation) that a parallel event could also be held in Palestine, but even in the case this can’t happen this Jerusalem summit will be the best antidote to the toxic narrative that no partnership between our two sides is possible, a narrative that has been used to oppress us all. As Palestinians and Israelis, we will demonstrate the possibility of being united, on this path to peace.
Particular emphasis will be placed on the role of women in peacebuilding, and speakers from other former conflict zones will be present such as Monica McWilliams and Avila Kilmurry from Northern Ireland, who where key figures in that peace process. Also in this area we have so many women active on both sides, such as Women Wage Peace and its sister movement in the West Bank, Women of the Sun, with thousands of members, but they have no representation at the decision-making level in Israel or Palestine. As ALLMEP we have started a program called Women’s Leadership Network, a way to provide the tools and skills essential to become effective advocates for peace from both Israel and Palestine. Very soon we will be doing a first round of presentations in Europe and the US, so that this reality can be taken into account by policy makers.
The last thing I want to say is that we will not give up, because that would mean leaving the field open to extremists on both sides, and none of us is willing to do that… And when I say we, I mean this growing community of Israelis and Palestinians who have decided to come together to say: enough war, enough killing, enough, there is another way. And if we don’t give up, neither can you [laughs…]. But to all of you who for months [in fact, for years!] have been following this daily tragedy of death and devastation with growing helplessness, let me say: it doesn’t matter much whether you are pro-Palestinian or pro-Israeli, if you really want to do something useful, join us in our struggle for a peaceful solution. that is where you must channel your energies, support us in this third narrative. So take our message to your government, to your political decision-makers, put pressure on them for us, talk about us, tell your friends about this amazing alliance of movements, this coalition of organizations that is so steadfast in their co-resistance to violence and so determined towards peace.
We are not giving up and we are doing all this for the future generations. And this is very clear for me since I’m a mother of a 14-year-old boy and I want him to have a normal life. To be able to take a bus without panicking for I don’t know what is going to happen. It is in our hands to make a better future, and this is what we are doing.
Thanks to Sara Cammarelle for the subtitles of the video.
