Neve Shalom: Good News for Peace in Israel
Oasis of Peace is Neve Shalom in Hebrew and Wahat al-Salam in Arabic. It is the name of a village in Israel that is 50% Jewish, 50% Arab. It was formed in the late 1970’s by families who wanted to demonstrate that Jews and Arabs could indeed live together in, to use an American term, an integrated fashion. (Jews and Arabs live in Haifa and other towns, but one would never use the term integration to describe their living arrangements.) They also wanted to raise children in schools that did not teach hatred. The village has twice been nominated for the Nobel Prize for Peace.