Connecting Through The Arts

Connecting Through The Arts is a program with children from the Palestinian village of Husan and the Israeli towns of Nes Harim and Tsur Hadassah , ages 6-13. The children work with art materials with an open-ended structure and each child creates their own unique construction. At the end of the program each child is encouraged to speak to the group about what they made , together with translation for both groups. The art activities involve bringing awareness to the environment, for example painting pot plants and then planting seedlings in the pots. The other component of the program is the teaching of English songs to help introduce the children to the English language, they also have the opportunity to share songs from their culture, in Arabic and Hebrew. When the war began we temporarily paused the program and resumed it via Zoom sessions and we look forward to returning to face-to-face gatherings when the time is right. The children had begun to make connections with each other by meeting in person and they, as well as the staff, were interested in keeping the connections going. The program is heartwarming and uplifting to see, as it brings two groups of children together , Israelis and Palestinians, who otherwise have no contact with each other. They get to experience the other as real, live children, just like them!