Groundwork

Hundreds of thousands of Israelis fill the streets alongside Einav Zangauker, shouting, “Deal! Now!” Einav’s son Matan was taken hostage by Hamas almost one year ago, and she has since become a leading voice for the hostage families. Her demand is simple–that her son, and the rest of the hostages held in Gaza, come home. This episode tells the story of one mother’s fight, against great odds, to demand better, to bring her son home safely, and to lead a movement for change.

This episode was reported by Dina Kraft and produced and edited by Julie Subrin. Groundwork is produced by Elisheva Goldberg, Nick Acosta, Yoshi Fields, Julie Subrin, and Dina Kraft. Scoring by Joel Shupack with music by Blue Dot Sessions. Theme music by System Ali. This show is a joint production between the Alliance for Middle East Peace (ALLMEP) and New Israel Fund. You can learn more about them on their websites www.allmep.org and www.nif.org. On this podcast, hosts and guests express their views. These do not necessarily reflect the official views or stances of the organizations.

Last season, Elisheva Goldberg took us on a trip to Umm al Khair, a village in the West Bank carrying on the legacy of the late peace activist Hajj Suleiman. Now, amidst home demolitions and settler violence, we return to Area C for an update on the people living there and the solidarity movements working to support them.

Listen back to Elisheva's first piece, “A Quiet Transfer,” from Season 2 of Groundwork.

Learn more about these movements below:

Combatants for Peace

Breaking the Silence

Yesh Din

Center for Jewish Nonviolence

Shatil

Rabbis for Human Rights

Achvat Amim

On October 7th, Vivan Silver, a lifetime peace activist with Women Wage Peace, AJEEC-NISPED, Road to Recovery, and many more, was murdered in Kibbutz Be'eri. This week, we’re talking to her son, Yonatan Zeigen, about honoring her legacy through his own peace activism. Join us as we talk to Yonatan about his work and the challenges facing peace activists on the ground.

Learn more about the Vivian Silver Impact Award, given to one Palestinian and one Jewish Israeli each year.

Organizations supported or founded by Vivian Silver:

AJEEC-NISPED (Arab-Jewish Center for Empowerment, Equality, and Cooperation – Negev Institute for Strategies of Peace and Economic Development) is an Arab-Jewish organization for social change

Road to Recovery is an Israeli Association of volunteers who drive Palestinian patients - primarily children - from checkpoints in the West Bank and Gaza for life-saving treatments in Israeli hospitals.

Women Wage Peace was founded in the aftermath of the 50-day Gaza War/Operation Protective Edge of 2014. Women Wage Peace (WWP) has grown to 50,000 Israeli members, the largest grassroots peace movement in Israel today, alongside its Palestinian sister movement Women of the Sun.

B’tselem is a Jerusalem-based non-profit organization whose stated goals are to document human rights violations in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories, combat any denial of the existence of such violations, and help to create a human rights culture in Israel.

Alliance for Middle East Peace is a network of more than 160 Palestinian and Israeli peacebuilding organizations.

Project Rozana is committed to building bridges between Israelis and Palestinians through the field of health care, the only area of civil society where people meet on such a broad scale with mutual respect.

This episode was produced and edited by Yoshi Fields. Groundwork is produced by Elisheva Goldberg, Nick Acosta, Yoshi Fields, Julie Subrin, and Dina Kraft. Theme music by System Ali. This show is a joint production between the Alliance for Middle East Peace (ALLMEP) and New Israel Fund. You can learn more about them on their websites www.allmep.org and www.nif.org. On this podcast, hosts and guests express their views. These do not necessarily reflect the official views or stances of the organizations.

This episode was produced and edited by Yoshi Fields. Groundwork is produced by Elisheva Goldberg, Nick Acosta, Yoshi Fields, Julie Subrin, and Dina Kraft. Theme music by System Ali. This show is a joint production between the Alliance for Middle East Peace (ALLMEP) and New Israel Fund. You can learn more about them on their websites www.allmep.org and www.nif.org. 

In Israel today, there are only nine bilingual schools. These are schools where Palestinian and Jewish Israeli kids learn alongside one another and lessons are taught in both Hebrew and Arabic. These are the only formal educational institutions where kids learn one another’s histories and cultures, and from an early age, play, study, and work with each other. This week, we’re talking to Mohammad Kundos, a principal in one of these schools. Mohammad’s school is part of a network called Hand in Hand. We talked to him about how and why bilingual education can have an exponential impact on the future, how learning your own history as well as that of your neighbor impacts young people, and the ways that Hand in Hand schools aren’t just imagining change, but doing and living it every day on their campuses.

This episode was produced and edited by Yoshi Fields. Groundwork is produced by Elisheva Goldberg, Nick Acosta, Yoshi Fields, Julie Subrin, and Dina Kraft. Theme music by System Ali. This show is a joint production between the Alliance for Middle East Peace (ALLMEP) and New Israel Fund. You can learn more about them on their websites www.allmep.org and www.nif.org. On this podcast, hosts and guests express their views. These do not necessarily reflect the official views or stances of the organizations.

We’re back with season 3 of Groundwork, a podcast about activists on the ground working to end the occupation, stop this endless bloodshed, and demand justice, peace, and equality for all. This week, we’re introducing a new host, activist and comedian Noam Shuster. Noam joins co host Sally Abed to introduce the new season and talk about what these last several months have been like for activists working on the ground in Israel and Palestine.

This episode was produced and edited by Yoshi Fields. Groundwork is produced by Elisheva Goldberg, Nick Acosta, Yoshi Fields, Julie Subrin, and Dina Kraft. Music is by System Ali. The show is a joint production by the New Israel Fund and the Alliance for Middle East Peace.

Learn more about the show at www.groundworkpodcast.com

We just finished season two. But before we sign off fully, we wanted to give you a special episode. We're turning the mic around! Groundwork creator and producer Yoshi Fields sat down with host Sally Abed to talk about her experience as a Palestinian activist in Israel. Sally is a member of the national leadership of Standing Together - the largest Jewish Arab grassroots movement in Israel. 

Groundwork is created and produced by Dina Kraft and Yoshi Fields. Content and audio editing by Yoshi. Yoshi  scored the episode. Additional content editing by Elisheva Goldberg and Nick Acosta. Art and design by Nick Acosta. Groundwork is a joint production of New Israel Fund and the Alliance for Middle East Peace.

In Israel-Palestine today, many people feel trapped in a century-long circle of violence. The closest breakthrough came thirty years ago in 1993, with the Oslo Accords. In this week's episode, we hear a story about May Pundak, Executive Director of A Land For All. May is the daughter of one of the architects of Oslo, Ron Pundak. But she thinks she may be onto a different model for peace that can break the cycle where Oslo went wrong. It’s not a two-state or one-state solution, but an idea that requires that we renew the conversation with some new thinking - one homeland.

Groundwork is created and produced by Dina Kraft and Yoshi Fields. It is hosted by Dina Kraft and Sally Abed. They also reported this episode. Content and audio editing by Yoshi Fields. Additional content editing by Elisheva Goldberg and Nick Acosta. Joel Shupack scored the piece. Art and design by Nick Acosta. Groundwork is a joint production of New Israel Fund and the Alliance for Middle East Peace.

We’re back with our one-on-one series, Ground Report, where we sit down with an activist to have a conversation about who they are, what motivates them, and what kind of future they imagine for the region. This week’s guest is Yara Amayra. Yara is a Palestinian activist from the south of Hebron in the West Bank. She has worked with Women Wage Peace, New Story Leadership, and now works as the Palestinian Co- Director of Land for All.

In the interview, we start out talking about how she got into activism, and then, things got really emotional. Peacebuilding and anti-occupation work is hard work for everyone, but uniquely challenging for Palestinians. It requires immense amounts of hope and optimism, and the ability to be able to imagine a better future for this place. Having that vision, and being able to see it clearly, is so important for activists working in this field.

Groundwork is created and produced by Dina Kraft and Yoshi Fields. Ground Report is reported by Sally Abed, with content and audio editing by Yoshi. Yoshi also scored the piece. Additional content editing by Elisheva Goldberg and Nick Acosta. Art and design by Nick Acosta. Groundwork is a joint production of New Israel Fund and the Alliance for Middle East Peace.

This week, we're featuring a story from our friends at the Unsettled podcast. Unsettled features difficult conversations and diverse viewpoints on Israel-Palestine and the Jewish diaspora.

The episode is called, "The Calderons are Unsettled (Pt. 1)" and follows Unsettled producer Asaf Calderon. Asaf's parents raised him to think critically and to fight against injustice, even if it means going against what most people consider normal. But today, even while their values remain the same, there is a deep ideological rift between them when it comes to Zionism.

In this episode, Asaf sits down with his parents, Nissim and Rivka Calderon, to learn about their political development and discuss whether Zionism is compatible with left politics and Palestinian rights.

Part 2 is available here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-calderons-are-unsettled-part-2/id1253624935?i=1000548482571

You can find Unsettled on Instagram, and wherever you find podcasts: https://www.instagram.com/unsettled_pod/?hl=en

Dr. Tareq Abu Hamed is a Palestinian environmental scientist from East Jerusalem, but he works at a Kibbutz near the southern tip of Israel, at the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies. To say this is unusual, is an understatement. Yet, Tareq feels that science gives him a unique way to make connections between Palestinians and Israelis, and even Jordanians, who are all facing the same climate crisis – and also creating a more sustainable world.

Groundwork is created and produced by Dina Kraft and Yoshi Fields. It is hosted by Dina Kraft and Sally Abed. The episode was reported by Miriam Herschlag. Content and audio editing by Yoshi Fields. Additional content editing by Elisheva Goldberg and Nick Acosta. Joel Shupack scored the piece. Art and design by Nick Acosta. Groundwork is a joint production of New Israel Fund and the Alliance for Middle East Peace.