Arab/Jewish Intergroup Dialogue Courses

Conflict on Campuses

The Israeli/Palestinian conflict is a focus of attention in many communities across the world, and no less on U.S. college campuses. Although most Arab and Jewish students in the United States may not have lived inside the area of conflict abroad, some still do, and for many their emotions run deep and can create controversy and segregation within college campuses. Students who identify as Arab and Jewish may experience significant stress and tension related to the conflict abroad, and this may translate into concerns about safety. Some have questioned the safety of Jewish students on college campuses; for example, at UC Berkeley it was reported that a member of Students for Justice in Palestine assaulted a Jewish student (Beckwith & Rossman-Benjamin, 2010; Dinkelspiel, 2011). Arab American students in the United States, the majority of whom are Christian, experience hostility and challenges to their American loyalties (Jaschik, 2005b, August 22). The case of the Irvine 11 at UC Irvine resulted in 10 Muslim students receiving three years probation for disrupting a speech by Israel’s ambassador (Cruz, Williams, & Anton, 2011). The clash of views engages faculty as well as students, with professors reporting marginalization, threats, and tenure review problems (Jaschik, 2005a; Wilson, 2008). This animosity has created a significant need for a safe space to communicate with the other.

Jewish organizations on campuses often respond to activities and events that criticize the Israeli government, and many debate whether these events are anti-Semitic (Nelson, 2012). A number of university presidents have not supported the divestment movement (Anti-Defamation League, 2011). Recently, J Street U, an organization that supports a two state solution and equal rights for all citizens of Israel, has become more active on college campuses to push forward a progressive Jewish vision of Israel (J Street U, 2012). These struggles mirror those in Jewish communities across the United States, where discussion on the topic of Israel lacks civility and has recently been characterized as “the third rail” (Vitello, 2010, para. 1).

Arab students engage in activism surrounding this conflict in a number of ways. Some Arab students are involved in boycott, divestment, and sanction movements on campuses (BDS Movement, 2012). Advocacy and education about Arab and Palestinian rights is an important goal for many of these students. Student organizations that have been created “To promote justice, human rights, liberation, and self-determination for the Palestinian people” are spreading all over the campuses in the United States (http://calsjp.org/about/). These organizations support the BDS movement, showing this support in ways varying from silent protests and walkouts (University of Michigan, 2011), to initiatives for campus-wide divestment of companies that either support or profit from the occupation of Palestine. Aside from boycott and divestment, Arab students are highly discouraged from engaging in dialogue with Jewish students on these campuses for fear of normalizing the occupation (Abu Sarah, 2011). Many of these organizations have expressed that dialogue is a discourse used between two equal sides, who are on the same playing field, and deem that dialogue between pro-Israelis and pro-Palestinians is inappropriate given the immense power disparity between the two sides (Founas & Haydar, 2011).

College campuses have been recognized by major political lobbies as significant arenas to engage individuals on the conflict. This has led groups such as AIPAC to create a Leadership Development Department, “With the goal of teaching students about its issues and then molding them into effective pro-Israel advocates” (University of Southern California, 2012, para. 1). This department targets students involved in their university student governments. This kind of recruitment and swaying of opinions makes interactions and relationships amongst Arab and Jewish on college campuses incredibly difficult. These events and interactions are but a fraction of those occurring on U.S. college campuses, and have only been escalating in recent years, making the need for dialogue extremely necessary.

Campus Intergroup Work Between Arab and Jewish Students

A limited number of U.S. campuses have implemented intergroup dialogue courses, alternative spring break trips, and other approaches in response to the tensions mounting among Jews, Muslims, Arabs, and others who are passionate about this conflict (Dessel & Ali, 2011). These campus efforts highlight the asymmetry of power between Israelis and Palestinians, the struggles of Arab and Jewish Diaspora communities in the United States related to the conflict, the interest of Jewish students to learn about the Palestinian and Arab experience and explore commonalities, and the concern of Arab students for activism and action.

Khuri (2004a, 2004b) describes a seven-week campus intergroup dialogue course at the University of Illinois that was designed to support students in positive expression of emotions and productive engagement with the conflict to promote a deeper understanding of the complexity of the issues. One person identified as Palestinian, and three others identified as Jewish, whereas the rest of the participants were of other different identities. Participants tended to focus on either pro-Palestinian or pro-Israeli views. This created an interesting dynamic within the group that became an obstacle for facilitators who tried to balance airtime and topics of interest. Students reported they increased their understanding and ability to interact with others who held different views, recognized multiple perspectives, and clarified their own beliefs. Student learning was associated with hearing what their peers believed, readings, films and facilitation. Khuri emphasized the critical attention needed to emotion in intergroup dialogues on this topic.

The University of California, Irvine has established a program called the Olive Tree Initiative. The Olive Tree Initiative sent student groups who were Jewish, Christian, Muslim and nonreligious backgrounds to Israel/Palestine in 2008 and 2009. On these trips, students were exposed to as many different perspectives of the conflict as possible, and shared their experiences through a publication and speaking on campus (OTI, 2011). Clark University, through their Difficult Dialogues initiative, implemented a course on the conflict that engaged Israeli, Palestinian, and students of other identities (Williams & Sarrouf, 2010).

The Minds of Peace experiment is a simulation of a public negotiation congress that is held all around the world and on many U.S. campuses (Handelman, 2010). At campuses such as UC Irvine, University of Missouri St. Louis, Sanford-Brown College, and University of Michigan, Sapir Handelman and Mazen Badra seek to engage the public in preparations for peace by discussing and debating solutions (Dessel & Ali, 2011; Handelman, 2010). Each negotiating session of Palestinian and Israeli citizen delegates has produced a list of agreements, and the aim is to prepare citizens to engage with each other as grassroots peacemakers.

Intergroup Dialogue

Intergroup dialogue is a process that is situated within an interdisciplinary theoretical and practice model (Dessel & Rogge, 2008; Stewart & Zediker, 2000). Dialogic communication involves sharing of personal experiences and engagement with emotions, suspending assumptions and active listening, acknowledging ambiguity and ambivalence, and seeking out shared new meanings (Dessel & Rogge, 2008). Attention to equalizing power is critical in dialogue work (Agbaria & Cohen, 2002). Practitioners across academic and community settings both nationally and internationally use dialogic methods of communication to promote empathy and perspective-taking, address conflict, transform relationship goals and create social change (Gergen, McNamee, & Barrett, 2002; Nagda, Kim, & Truelove, 2004; United Nations Development Programme, 2012).

Intergroup dialogue is an important group work approach that promotes social change by supporting empowerment of participants and coalition building across differences (Alvarez & Cabbil, 2001; Bargal, 2008; Dessel, 2009). The method engages group processes such as mutually supportive group interactions, transparency, participatory facilitators who are not neutral but contribute their own experiences, and power sharing among group members (Kurland, 2007; Kurland & Salmon, 2006). The understanding of social identity and small group process that dialogue work affords is critical to promoting positive intergroup relations in society (Hogg, Abrams, Otten, & Hinkle, 2004; Spencer, Brown, Griffin, & Abdullah, 2008).

Higher education uses intergroup dialogue pedagogy as a method of social justice education and a promising approach to addressing intergroup identity conflict (Nagda, Gurin, Sorensen, & Zúñiga, 2009). Participants from two social identity groups with historical conflict engage in a credit bearing semester-long course that is highly structured and facilitated by trained student peers representing the two identities. Connections between personal and structural power and oppression are examined, and reflection is linked to social action (Zúñiga, Nagda, Chesler, & Cytron-Walker, 2007). A national randomized study on race and gender intergroup dialogues found that students evidenced significant increases in intergroup understanding, relationships, and social justice action (Nagda et al., 2009). Intergroup dialogues involving Arab and Jewish students have been widely used in Israel (Abu-Nimer, 1999; Halabi, 2000; Mollov & Lavie, 2001). However, we did not locate any studies other than Khuri’s that have empirically examined Arab/Jewish intergroup dialogue courses on U.S. college campuses.

Research Questions

Our research seeks to answer the following questions with regard to Arab and Jewish students who took an undergraduate Arab/Jewish intergroup dialogue course: (1) What are the pre-perceptions of the other group, the experiences in the dialogue, and the outcomes for the students in the intergroup dialogue course? (2) What was the nature of conflict in the courses, and what understanding about power, privilege and oppression might have developed? (3) What communication skills, positive relationships, and intentions to act to resolve intergroup conflict might have resulted from participation?

Sample and Pedagogy

This study analyzed the final course papers and post-dialogue qualitative interviews of all 25 self-identified Arab and Jewish undergraduate students who participated in two Arab/Jewish intergroup dialogue courses in 2009 and 2010 at the University of X. The 12 Arab students (nine men, three women; five 1^st year, one sophomore, three junior, three senior) identified as Muslim, Palestinian, Lebanese, Brazilian, Christian Chaldean, and Iraqi. The 13 Jewish students (nine women, four men; three 1^st year, nine sophomore, one junior) identified as American, Israeli, Hong Kong national, and Iranian. Each dialogue was co-facilitated by two peers who identified as Arab and Jewish. These undergraduate intergroup dialogue courses are 2 credit semester courses that follow a four stage pedagogical design. The dialogues begin with creating group guidelines and developing a shared understanding of dialogic communication. For example, students read and participate in an exercise that distinguishes among the communication styles of discussion, debate, and dialogue. Students share personal narratives and explore differences and commonalities of experiences. They then engage in dialogue about hot topics, and move toward building alliances and planning for action (Zúñiga et al., 2007). Students integrate content readings with experiential process, analyze individual and structural power, privilege and oppression, and link reflection to action (Zúñiga et al., 2007).

A team of Arab and Jewish students, faculty and student affairs staff developed the pedagogy for this Arab/Jewish intergroup dialogue course. A binary identity model was followed based on other intergroup dialogue course identity topics (Zúñiga et al., 2007), and students specifically titled the course to reflect nationality rather than religion. The curriculum used and adapted a number of different program exercises to examine power and privilege. A privilege walk (McIntosh, 1988) from The Jewish Multiracial Network’s Ashkenazi/White Jewish Privilege Checklist (http://www.jewishmultiracialnetwork .org/) was adapted and designed to illuminate the privileges white Jewish students hold due to their racial identity in the United States, as well as privileges that Christian Arab students might hold. The reading How Did Jews Become White Folks (Brodkin, 1998) accompanied this exercise. Another exercise, called the Power Map Out, was written to help students analyze the different kinds of power and privilege that Jewish and Arab students hold, as well as the discrimination and oppression they experience. A gallery walk exercise (Zúñiga et al., 2007) was adapted to provide visual examples of important concepts, such as land resources, Diaspora experiences, freedom of speech and political power. Personal narrative readings (for example, see Erakat, 2005; Troy, 2006) from both groups provide a nuanced analysis of multiple and intersecting identities and experiences.

Pre-perceptions of Other Group

Jewish students’ pre-perceptions of Arab students were different than Arab students’ pre-perceptions of Jewish students. Although some Jewish students viewed their Arab peers as cliquey, or had heard negative Arab stereotypes, some Arab students mistrusted Jewish students or viewed them as “My enemy for most of my life”. Alternatively, there were positive appraisals for each group. Jewish students recognized that Arab stereotypes were not true, “Because I knew, stereotypes about Jewish people weren’t necessarily true about me.” Arab students differentiated Jewish friends from Zionists and Muslim Arab students respected the historical part that Judaism plays in the Islamic faith. In general, most Arab and Jewish students reported significant segregation among themselves on campus, and said that when they were friends with each other they avoided discussion of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.

Outcomes

Both Arab and Jewish students in the dialogues reported on a number of outcomes that progressed from the development of communication and listening skills to critical self-reflection, perspective-taking and empathy, development of friendships, and action for social change.

Communication and Listening Skills

One of the key components of intergroup dialogue is the fostering of new communication skills. Skills students reported learning included using “I” statements, pausing three seconds before jumping in to respond to something about which they disagreed, expressing themselves genuinely and honestly rather than attacking others or trying to disprove them, suspension of judgment, and listening with empathy. These intercultural communication skills are critical when engaging across identity differences or around hot topics (Zúñiga et al., 2007).

One Jewish student shared about this learning:

I’ve learned to listen a lot more and to actually listen and hear and process what other people are saying and then think about what I have to say, process that and then say it out loud, cause sometimes you just want to speak out and say exactly what you’re thinking but that’s not always an effective way to communicate, and I just also learned that you should speak in ‘I feel’, ‘I want this’, ‘This happened to me’, instead of generalizing your entire race because you can’t speak for all the Jewish people or all the Arab people.

An Arab student shared similar learning: “You’re not going to build relationships with somebody and establish mutual ground if you’re constantly trying to disprove what they’re saying.”

Critical Self-Reflection

Critical self-reflection, defined as examining one’s social identity and experiences related to power, privilege and oppression (Nagda, 2006), was primarily noted around students’ reflections on their own socialization process and their stereotypes about the other group. For example, one Arab student shared:

The class started, and as (the two facilitators) spoke, the whole time I was thinking that there is no way that my thoughts on Jewish students would change. By the end of the first session this belief that I cannot have an open mind toward Jewish students was already being challenged. As I walk home from class that night, I already was changing my thoughts of how I should approach the students in this class. I started to question ‘Why do I hold these views. . .do I really believe these things?’ The thoughts of how I will approach this class for the rest of the year continue to circulate in my head the rest of the day, and through the night.

Arab students noticed that their “Early perceptions and notions about Jews were strictly based off what I’ve heard from other Arabs or my family. There was truth left out and truth altered” and that “it is dangerous to examine an issue from only one angle, regardless of how passionately one supports that angle.” Similarly, Jewish students also questioned their own education about the other group and recognized that their knowledge base was “biased” and “incorrect.” As one of these students indicated, “So, I guess it’s like they’re being manipulated, but then I questioned myself if I’m being manipulated in what is really going on,” and another confirmed,

Another rewarding takeaway I experienced from the dialogue is my newfound ability to think critically of what pro-Israel supporters say. Prior to the dialogue I would generally accept whatever was said by people in the pro-Israel movement as they were ‘On the same side.’ However I realized that a lot of what was being said was not accurate and unjustifiable.

Perspective-Taking

As a result of the dialogues, both groups of students indicated they could now take the perspective of the other group and empathize with them, thus experiencing a change in their perceptions of the other group. Jewish students had their stereotypes of Arab students challenged, they now understood the Palestinian perspective, they shifted from just seeing Jews as oppressed to now understanding the oppression of Palestinians, and were more receptive to opinions of Arab students. Jewish students expressed powerful examples of these shifts:

My inner justification for the Land of Israel wavered a little bit as a result of these readings and this class as a whole, and as a result of my self-reflection I now personally sympathize with the Palestinian plight more. Whereas before I would have had a pure hatred towards Palestinians for causing harm towards my people, I now am better able to internalize what the whole conflict is about.

As naive as it sounds, I had never considered what it might be like for an Arab student to lose a family member in Lebanon because of the conflict. I never considered how hard it is for them to not be able to visit their homeland because it is too dangerous. After that day, my perspective shifted. I became much more receptive to hearing the opinions of the Arab students.

Arab students also had their Jewish stereotypes challenged, felt more understanding of Jewish students and had a newfound respect for their Jewish peers. One student shared a powerful analogy:

The thoughts of how I will approach this class for the rest of the year continued to circulate in my head the rest of the day, and through the night. As the water from the shower makes its fall onto my head, each drop cleanses my thoughts, and begins the cleaning of my thoughts of the Jewish students. But this first shower was not enough. I knew it would take many weeks of showers to shed this layer of filth, years of negative thoughts of Jewish people that have built up.

Other Arab students recognized commonalities, such as “We’re all just boys and girls, we’re all just students,” and,

Death isn’t the only thing we all share. . .but life as well. These religions and racial differences are all different guidelines of how we should lead our life. If we all came into this world the same way, and we all leave the same way, then why should I let the social barriers society puts on identity groups (keep me) from living the same way?

Arab students indicated increased understanding of Jewish students, “Because when you build understanding for another side—when you build understanding for other people, it’s hard to be angry” and the building of mutual respect:

With taking this class I have made giant strides in my future, I will never neglect any opportunity because of the involvement of the Jewish faith. As I sat and spoke with my peers they really showed me that they understand my side and even agreed that I had the right to think about them the way I did. However the turning point was when I put myself in their shoes and tried understanding were they came from. When I was able to do this I knew that I could never look at the Jewish community the same again. I have a newfound respect for my Jewish colleagues.

Friendships Built

The recognition of commonalties and increased understanding of the other expressed above led, many times, to a deep sense of friendship and bonding among students. Jewish and Arab students both described the importance of the friendships they built, and their commitment to being allies for each other. The friendships were mentioned by both groups of students as the “Most rewarding part of the course” and something they valued highly. They attributed the development of friendships to building comfort and trust through the dialogue process. The intergroup dialogue model offered the students the opportunity to get to know each other well, because as one student said, “You’re actually. . .more or less putting your heart and soul out there in class sometimes and it can be pretty emotional and (a) high-stress environment,” and to ultimately “Feeling more closely connected.” An Arab student and a Jewish student, respectively, mirrored the transformation they both experienced:

As I make my way through the door, I no longer see a room half full of enemies; on the contrary the room is full of friends. These are friends that I have just begun to understand, friends that have helped me open my eyes and become the more open-minded person I am today.

We did not agree on every issue along the way, but we were able to come to an understanding of each other. Achieving an understanding and an acceptance of other’s opinion is accomplishing a great deal. Throughout the semester, we made tremendous progress in developing trust within the group. We came into the dialogue as strangers who didn’t expect to get along, and we left later as friends full of trust and understanding of one another.

Allyhood and Action

Ultimately, both Arab and Jewish students expressed their intended and actual actions to educate others, interrupt oppression, and form alliances. They worked together on their intergroup collaboration projects (ICPs), a final dialogue course assignment that asked them to engage across identities to develop a collaborative project outside of the classroom designed to address a common concern related to their social identity and inequalities. An Arab student expressed his willingness to face the risks of alliances with Jews:

I know that the bond my peers and I formed will not magically cause peace in the Middle East. I also know that even in my extended family people would look at me as interacting with the enemy, but it is a risk I am willing to take because I am sure my peers have to face the same harassment. I will never be ashamed to admit my alliance with the Jews. I am ready to counter any act that comes my way; no obstacle will break the bonds I have formed this semester.

Another Arab student identified his specific actions to interrupt bias:

I want the Jewish students to know that I am their ally and that I will not let hateful slurs or comments about Jews slide without denouncing them. In the beginning of the year I would have just laughed but now I can’t see myself doing that now.

A Jewish student similarly stated his intention to educate others to prevent misinformation about Arabs:

One of the most important goals people should take out of the dialogue is to combat misinformation about the other side. Being a part of (a pro-Israel group) on campus, I will also ensure that any future events we hold accurately represent Arabs and that no stereotypes are introduced in any movies we screen or speakers we bring in. In the past we have brought in several controversial speakers whose ideas and opinions conflict with what I have learned about Arabs in this dialogue.

Both groups reflected critically on what being an ally means to them. One Jewish student noted her transformation in this way, “It surprised me because I didn’t realize how much of an advocate and ally of an Arab I would be and before this, and now after this whole thing, I am complete allies of them,” whereas an Arab student similarly commented:

While some members of the group had suggested that being an ally of Jewish students meant less criticism of Israel, I am unable to meet that. However, I am willing and ready and able to be an ally of the Jewish community by combating anti-Semitism. After reading Dowty’s ‘Jewish Story,’ I am much more aware of the kinds of things that sit in the back of Jewish students minds, and I realize that I do not have to support Israel to support the Jewish people. My support comes from the battle of anti-Semitism as well as the belief that despite everything going on, there isn’t an inherent hatred between Arabs and Jews.

No Change

Two themes of note emerged related to no change in beliefs and feelings. First, Jewish students had an extremely difficult time recognizing any privilege that they might hold, either in Israel or in the United States related to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Although some acknowledged privilege, particularly in relation to being white, others expressed confusion and anxiety, and referenced the strong history of Jewish victimization related to the Holocaust, and the precarious state of Israel being surrounded by Arab countries. As two of these Jewish students reflected:

It’s difficult for me to read this section and think of Arabs instead of Jews. My immediate reaction is that there is no place outside Israel where Jews are the majority and where we are the ones with the ‘unearned privilege.’ But unearned privilege implies that someone else isn’t getting the same benefits, and that’s where the conflict gets complicated.

But I think in the sense of privilege and being oppressed, I mean, in history Jews have faced tons of discrimination between the Holocaust so I think right now we’re in a good place but it could obviously change, so I wouldn’t say that I’m privileged or that I’m an oppressor.

There is still much work to be done with regard to how the asymmetry of power influences recruitment, process, and outcomes of intergroup work. Groups with more power typically seek to explore commonalities and have less inclination to examine or change power differentials (Saguy, Dovidio, & Pratto, 2008). As one Arab student noted,

I mentioned before the target group wants to focus on differences and the agent group wants to focus on the similarities, so they are looking at two completely different things. Until they can kind of align themselves and look at the same thing, no progress is actually going to be made and so in terms of power and privilege I think that is a huge concept and a huge aspect of the conflict itself that needs to be addressed.

Second, both Arab and Jewish students remained firm in the importance of the land connected to their respective ethnic identities, Jewish and Palestinian rights to the land, and the concept of a homeland. This was a particularly contested topic and often led students into debate rather than dialogue mode. However, the topic of land also appeared in many students’ reflections about taking on a new perspective, as both groups realized the important ties the other group has with the land.

Data from the one-year follow-up survey indicated the eight Jewish students had stayed in touch with eight Arab students, and the two Arab students with four Jewish students. Jewish students reported feeling more open, less likely to judge, more informed, more sympathetic, more critical of news, and recognized the humanitarian issue, yet disagreed with Arab students on how to stop suffering and on the topic of suicide bombers. Arab students reported less dislike of Jewish students and more understanding, they said they had learned the sources of intolerance in Jewish community and were shocked at this intolerance, and now viewed Jewish students as more misled rather than selfish.