“Hatred is a disease, and if not stopped or cured it will invade even more families, communities, and cities. Fanaticism prevails, eating away at the foundation of everything reasonable people have worked so hard to build. But now there are people on both sides who say: ENOUGH! Enough funerals, enough widows, enough tears, enough pain!”
“[ICfC] has the imagination and commitment to bring people together, civilizations together, creating history without hatred…”
- Elie Wiesel, Nobel Peace Laureate and Honorary Chairman of ICfC
................................................
ICfC is proud to share information about a partner project We Want (U) to Know, documenting the lives of the Khmer Rouge survivors. ICfC was an active partner during the making of the documentary.
As part of ICfC’s Justice and History Outreach Project, Cambodian villagers were helped to confront traumatic experiences associated with the atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge. The disregard for the memory at the highest level created a de facto intergenerational divide between the victims and their family members. According to the recent independent evaluation, the inter-generational dialogues of ICfC helped the elders to break their silence, brought skeptical youths and the elder generation closer, and enabled both generations to find their own ways of memorializing the tragedy and transmitting the lessons learned. ICfC also assisted in the creation of a documentary about the experiences of individuals during the time of the Khmer Rouge, and trained more than a dozen NGOs and universities in Cambodia on issues of conflict transformation and Historical Conciliation.
Negotiators and mediators, focused on interests, reject considerations of the past as “quagmire.” While many of their peace efforts initiated by governments and international agencies are at first promising, they often fail to yield successful results. The disappointment and frustration incite still greater violence in these conflicts that are dismissed as “intractable.” ICfC is aligned with those who recognize that if you want to make peace with “age old enemies” you must confront with them pained memories that are often magnified as they are transmitted from generation to generation. The past is never over, and historical grievances are ever available to stir up conflict even when present interests in cooperation are strong. If residual enmity and hatred are not resolved, all indicators imply that such conflicts will continue to fester.
The International Center for Conciliation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, has been able to create community rapprochement and strengthen faltering relations where violence has threatened, even where it has recurred. At the grassroots level, it succeeds by mediating pained memory, distorted history, and troubled personal identities. ICfC’s unique approach to community development through conciliation fosters empathy by deep and sustained community work, where each side commits itself to listening to the memories, fears and hopes of the other side and share their thoughts candidly. ICfC’s methodology of reconciling history-based ethnic and religious tensions at the community level is yielding positive results in Israel, Cambodia, India, and The Netherlands. The following two examples illustrate the impact:
ICfC MISSION
The International Center for Conciliation (ICfC) creates enduring peace in conflict-torn communities worldwide by helping them unfold their painful pasts and construct a shared future that is peaceful, productive and prosperous. Focusing on communities in the Middle East, Western Europe, and Asia, ICfC develops, applies, and disseminates its unique approach that deals with pained memories, hatred, history and identity with the help of governments, local community organizations, and citizens with outstanding leadership potential.
Israel – three communities [Yaad-Miaar, Pekiin, and the Hadar section of Haifa] Community impact has been documented through continued dialogues, cooperative Arab/Israeli citizen actions, and the planning of initiatives intended to increase contact between the conflicted groups. ICfC-led workshops between feuding parties have transformed aggression and hostility intocollaboration,
inspired joint youth and community programs, and triggered requests for expansion by new communities and participants.
Building on its successful pilot programs, ICfC is poised to expand its activities in Israel where ten communities—a mix of Jews, Arab, Bedouin, and Druze populations with rising tensions and divergent issues—have already been identified. Subsequent expansion will be undertaken within other communities in Israel and then, on a broader scale, to other areas of societal conflict in selected countries in the Middle East. ICfC is also proposing to expand its conciliation efforts in Cambodia to five additional villages by conducting inter-generational workshops for Khmer Rouge survivors and facilitating trips to visit the Khmer Rouge Tribunal, Toul Sleng (the prison), and the Choeng Ek killing field in Phnom Penh, as well as other sites relevant to history and justice.
In 2010, ICfC is committed to expanding its reach into these carefully selected target areas of conflict by focusing on the following key endeavors:
1. To leverage ICfC expertise by expanding its partnerships with local organizations on the ground;
2. To select and prioritize new target areas for potential conciliation and to build partnerships with other organizations that are engaged in conciliation practice; and
3. To broaden and increase its funding sources to enable ICfC to build an organizational presence which will continue to work on building peace while attracting the best and brightest to the field of conciliation.
The road to peace is challenging, to say the least. ICfC is respectful of the efforts of others, including state and local governments in the international community, who work tirelessly to address and resolve the political issues that contribute to conflicts. The ICfC methodology, however, digs deeper, bringing out the pained memories as part of the healing process. The ICfC approach not only leads to conflict resolution that produces positive outcomes but also focuses on fostering leaderships in the communities enabling them to continue to build peace and carry the torch to further healing.
ICfC makes a difference.
Top Copyright 2010, International Center for Conciliation.
All Rights Reserved.
