“turning hatred on its head into friendship”
Welcome to MouthPeace. Thank you for visiting our home page. A “mouthpiece,” in common usage, is a voice that represents you. We want to give a new voice to Arabs and Jews and persons of all other ethnicities in Israel. But we are more than a voice. We are MouthPeace because we believe that the best thing that could happen to Arabs and Jews in Israel and adjacent territories is to become friends.
Mission Statement
It is our mission to reduce nationality-and-religion-based tension in Israel and adjacent territories by creating and promoting private individual friendships between Arabs and Jews.
Our Perspective
Mistrust, animosity, stereotypes, and mutual hatred have existed between Arabs and Jews since before the foundation of the State of Israel. The resulting tension threatens the well being of all the people of Israel.
Arabs and Jews are great, proud, beautiful, and ancient people. They descend from and will be defined through all eternity by a common biblical heritage. We want to reduce nationality-and-religion-based tension throughout all of Israel and adjacent territories. We want to turn hatred on its head into friendship.
Our Plan
Our plan is as follows:
1) We will form a sister Israeli organization (an Amutah) to carry out the purposes of MouthPeace Inc. (the US organization.) The Founders of the Israeli organization shall consist of an equal number of Jews and Arabs residing in Israel. With the consent of the Israeli Founders, some of the Directors of the US Company may also serve as Founders of the Israeli organization.
2) We will open a space in Israel to accomplish our mission, which will be our home. At this space, we will ask all who enter to show acceptance and respect for each other, notwithstanding any differences of culture, religion, history, or national aspiration.
3) Our home will be centrally located in Israel. It will be a welcoming multi-ethnic multi-functional multi-accommodating reception center.
4) We will model our organization after Big Brother and Big Sister organizations which introduce adult mentors to children except that, significantly, we will be introducing adults to adults. However, MouthPeace (that is, both the US and the Israeli organizations combined) will be inter-generational, in that it will serve adults and also children supervised by adults.
5) We will establish an administrative process which will be designed to create, promote, encourage, and facilitate private individual friendships between Arabs and Jews and persons of all other ethnic backgrounds. We will also establish an administrative apparatus which will be designed to provide Arabs and Jews and persons of all other ethnic backgrounds in Israel and adjacent territories, to the fullest extent permitted by law, access to communications and information, governmental and non-governmental, which may help them in their private lives.
The Four Imperatives
1 We are different. Culturally, historically, geographically, and in aspiration, tradition, and biblical and religious heritage, we are different.
2 We must listen to each other.
3 We must accept each other.
4 We must respect each other.
Geographical Starting Point
Because our organization is new, we will start only within the green line boundaries of Israel including East Jerusalem, to simplify restrictions of travel for everyone participating in our organization. Later we will extend our operations to adjacent territories.
Our First Project: A Restaurant Project
Our first planned project will be a restaurant project. Several restaurants in Israel provide (or have recently provided) half-price meals to anyone sitting at a specific table where there are seated both an Arab and a Jew. We intend to create a network of existing restaurants in Israel that agree to such a plan. We intend to induce their participation by offering restaurants free advertising in Israeli media.
To assure that this project will result in reduction of ethnic tensions, we intend to enlist the services of persons with professional backgrounds including psychologists; sociologists; specialists in organization, conflict resolution, regional geography and history; and, vitally, religious leaders and authorities.
