Event: The University of British Columbia and Peace it Together are hosting a Pacific Dialogue about building peace between Israelis and Palestinians
Date/Time: Saturday, Jan. 8, 2011 at 7:30 p.m.
Location: Chan Centre for the Performing Arts
6265 Crescent Road, UBC
For a map, visit http://www.maps.ubc.ca/?130
To arrange interviews with the speakers or to attend the event, contact Heather Amos at 604.822.3213 or heather.amos@ubc.ca
In a region that experiences conflict on a daily basis, two institutions are working with both Israeli and Palestinian communities, governments and scholars to advance peace in the Middle East. The directors of these two institutions, experts on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, will be in Vancouver for a discussion panel on building peace and a sustainable society in the region.
Gershon Baskin, Co-director and founder of the Israel/Palestine Center for Research and Information (IPCRI), and Sami Adwan, Co-director of the Peace Research Institute in the Middle East (PRIME), will participate in the dialogue event, hosted by UBC and Peace it Together, on Saturday evening at the Chan Centre for the Performing Arts.
Stephen Owen, UBC’s Vice President, External, Legal and Community Relations and a former Canadian cabinet minister who has worked on peace building projects in Africa, Latin America, Southeast Asia and Eastern Europe, will moderate the discussion. Reena Lazar, Executive Director of Peace it Together, will also participate in the dialogue and announce a summer 2011 film project at UBC.
Media are invited to attend the Pacific Dialogue and the speakers will be available in advance of Saturday’s event for interviews.
Gershon Baskin is the co-director and founder of IPCRI, a unique joint Israeli-Palestinian public policy think tank. Baskin works in Jerusalem with Israeli and Palestinian policy makers and has published books and articles about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Before founding IPCRI, Baskin worked in the field of Jewish-Arab relations within Israel, in Interns for Peace, the Ministry of Education and as Executive Director of the Institute for Education for Jewish-Arab Coexistence. For more information, visit http://www.ipcri.org/
Sami Adwan is a Palestinian professor of education at Bethlehem University and co-director of PRIME. His research focuses on the role of education in building peace, co-existing between different beliefs and religions. Adwan and PRIME have won numerous international awards recognizing their peace-building efforts in the Middle East. For more information, visit http://www.vispo.com/PRIME/about.htm
Peace it Together brings together youth leaders from opposing sides of a conflict to engage in constructive dialogue while co-creating short films to be used as peace-building tools in their communities. While it is currently focused on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Peace it Together envisions communities throughout the world engaged in peace-building and aims to have its program become a widely adopted model for peace-building. Peace it Together is partnering with UBC for its 2011 program. For more information, visit: www.peaceittogether.com
The University of British Columbia (UBC) is one of North America’s largest and most prestigious public research and teaching institutions, and one of only two Canadian institutions to be consistently ranked among the world’s 40 best universities. Surrounded by the beauty of the Canadian West, it is a place that inspires bold, new ways of thinking that have helped make it a national leader in areas as diverse as community service learning, sustainability and research commercialization. UBC attracts $550 million per year in research funding from government, non-profit organizations and industry through 7,000 grants. For more information, visit: www.ubc.ca
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