Educating Israel This page intentionally left blank Educating Israel Educational Entrepreneurship in Israel’s Multicultural Society Yehuda Bar Shalom EDUCATING ISRAEL © Yehuda Bar Shalom, 2006. Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2006 978-1-4039-7274-3 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. First published in 2006 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN™ 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010 and Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, England RG21 6XS Companies and representatives throughout the world. PALGRAVE MACMILLAN is the global academic imprint of the Palgrave Macmillan division of St. Martin’s Press, LLC and of Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. Macmillan® is a registered trademark in the United States, United Kingdom and other countries. Palgrave is a registered trademark in the European Union and other countries. ISBN 978-1-349-53395-4 ISBN 978-1-4039-8361-9 (eBook) DOI 10.1057/9781403983619 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Bar Shalom, Yehuda. [Ide’ah shel tikun. English] Educating Israel : educational entrepreneurship in Israel’s multicultural society / Yehuda Bar Shalom. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and (p. ) index. Translated from Hebrew 1. Multicultural education—Israel. 2. Pluralism (Social sciences)—Study and teaching—Israel. 3. Multiculturalism—Israel. I. Title. LC1099.5.175B37413 2006 370.117095694—dc22 2005058651 A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Design by Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd., Chennai, India. First edition: August 2006 10987654321 This book is dedicated to my spouse, Amira This book was written with kind support from The David Yellin College of Education, Jerusalem The Mofet Institute, Tel Aviv Temple Israel, Tulsa, Oklahoma The Jewish Federation of Tulsa, Oklahoma Alan B. Slifka Foundation, New York Lucuis N. Littauer Foundation, New York CONTENTS Acknowledgments ix Preface xi One Neve Shalom / Wahat Al-Salam 1 Two Bialik School 40 Three Keshet School 70 Four Kedma School 94 Five The Democratic School in Hadera 115 Six Comparison and Conclusion 129 Notes 148 Bibliography 154 Index 159 This page intentionally left blank ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I am indebted to many people who, over the years, have helped me to formulate the ideas presented in this book. I would like to thank Professor Charles Harrington and Professor Hope Jensen Leichter of Teachers College, Professor Joseph Lukinsky of the Jewish Theological Seminary, Dr. (Reverend) Earl Kooperkamp of Union Theological Seminary, Rabbi Andrew Hahn, from New York and Avraham Infeld of Melitz, Israel. Thanks to Dr. Itai Zimran, Dr. Nita Shochet, Dr. Revital Heiman, Dr. Anna Rousso, Dr. Ora Gravelsky, Dr. Ilana Sigad, Professor Aharon Shai, Dr. Bilha Piamenta, Talma Margalit, Dr. Hansaa Diab, Reuven Azulai, Sigal Muskal-Atzmon, Dr. Ruth Borstein, Dr. Dan Woolf, Dr. Yehudit Woolf, Yiftah Goldman, Dr. Einat Guberman, Dr. Tamar Asher, Dr. Amalia Shach, Yaron Lehavi, Vered Shavit, Dr. Raaya Yoeli, Dr. Revital Sela-Schiovitz, Dr. Reuven Garber, Miki Garber, Aryeh Ben David and Eyal Bloch, all of David Yellin Teachers College. I have been influenced by many other lecturers and students at David Yellin and appreciate their insightful comments on the research findings. Thanks to Dr. Yitzhak Mendelson, moderator of the Jewish-Arab dialogue group at David Yellin, which helped me clarify my thoughts in this field. Thanks to Dr. Yair Caspi, who helped me understand my role in both research and education. Thanks to Professor David Ohana of Ben Gurion University for his inspiring comments. Thanks to Dr. Zvi Bekerman and Professor Philip Wexler of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, to Yonatan Glaser of the association Hiburim, and to Loui Dobin of the Greene Family Camp in Texas. I thank Panim for Jewish Renewal in Israel, as well as a Jerusalem businessman who wishes to remain anonymous, for their donations. Thanks to Rabbi Levi Weiman-Kelman of Kol Haneshama Congregation, and to Luli Harris for her support and assistance. Special thanks to Rabbi Charles Sherman and Perry Simons of Tulsa, Oklahoma and to Professor x Acknowledgments Martin Belsky and Professor Paul Finkelman, both from The University of Tulsa. Thanks to Stacey Schusterman from Tulsa for her support, and to many other anonymous Tulsan donors. Thanks to Giora Rosen and to my editor, Timna Horowitz, for their wonderful help and support throughout the process of publishing the Hebrew version of this book. During my years of work as a teacher, lecturer and researcher, I have found that the martial arts and meditation help me develop the “mental muscles” needed to cope with various challenges. These disciplines helped me cope with the challenge of writing this book. Accordingly, thanks are due to my teacher in the Ohshima Shotokan method, Eli Cohen, who is presently serving as the Israeli ambassador to Japan. Thanks to my teacher and master, Aryeh Levy, to my karate students at Givat Shaul and Reut, who have stayed with me over the years, and to the Goenka’s Vipassana Association, which taught me a wonderful technique. Thanks to my wife, Amira, and to my children Nitzan, Ran and Yehonatan. Publishing a book is a demanding process, and I thank them for their tolerance. Thanks to Shaul Vardi ( Jerusalem) who translated this book into English, helped with the English editing, and prepared the index. Above all, I extend heartfelt thanks to the communities of educators and repairers presented in this book, and to all those working in a kindred spirit to repair Israeli society in education systems and in other spheres. I hope their voices will be heard more loudly, leading to the emergence of a better society that will adopt a humane and just social contract. This is nothing less than the basic right of each and every one of us. PREFACE The State of Israel was established in 1948. To a large extent, Israeli culture is still in the process of crystallization, providing a fascinating liv- ing laboratory that offers insights into the adaptive capabilities of humans in a society that is involved in developing its identity and searching for social goals. Israeli society has not yet produced an ethos of solidarity based on a clear and common myth. The emerging behavioral patterns range from pluralism and multiculturalism, at best, to division and sectarianism, without the possibility for a unifying narrative, at worst.1 The need to reach decisions on political, social, and cultural issues has obliged Israeli society to become aware of the modalities by which such decisions are made. The developing relations between the different communities that comprise the Israeli mosaic will clearly influence the manner and quality of these decisions. Israeli society is characterized by a level of multiculturalism that leads to the emergence of rifts. The most prominent problems within this society are as follows: ● The conflict between Arabs and Jews ● The conflict between religious and secular Jews ● The tension between religion and democracy ● The issue of migrant laborers and their integration in Israeli society ● Ethnic stratification within the Jewish population Within the Israeli education system, there are several formal frameworks that have assumed the task of addressing some of these conflicts. The educational ideology of the education system forms the infrastructure and justification for the existence of the educational framework, and for the manner in which it addresses the problem. Several schools around xii Preface Israel operate according to a unique ideological approach to these issues: ● The elementary school at Neve Shalom nurtures coexistence between Arabs and Jews; ● Bialik School in Tel Aviv develops an appropriate education system for the children of migrant laborers; ● Keshet School, whose guiding ideology is dialogue between secular and religious Jews; ● Kedma School, which aims to provide cultural nurturing for children from the Mizrachi community; ● The Democratic School in Hadera, which focuses on inculcating a perception of democracy. This book examines these schools, all of which aim in different ways to mend or Repair existing reality.2 In this context, this term means that these schools strive to Repair the particular rift within which they func- tion (Arab-Jewish, secular-religious, Mizrachi, etc.); in most cases, this goal emerges against the background of a personal narrative of distress on the part of the founders. In this book, I shall describe and analyze the manner in which this ideology is manifested in each school; as we shall see, both similarities and differences will emerge among the different schools included in the study. Case Studies The use of case studies and descriptions is now commonplace in educational training (LaBoskey, 1992). A case study teaches educators how to act in a similar situation or when the content is similar (Merriam, 1991). Its force comes not from quantitative representation, which can- not usually be achieved in a qualitative study, but rather from the ability of those in the field to implement some of the conclusions that it offers in cases with a similar context. To date, little attention has been paid in the professional literature to the schools discussed in this project. When documentation has been undertaken, it has usually discussed a single specific school, thus lacking a comparative dimension. In this book, I shall present each school separately, before examining their common characteristics as agents seek- ing to achieve the Repair of Israeli society, with its rifts and challenges. The elementary school in Neve Shalom strives to develop a curricu- lum enabling a positive encounter between Jewish and Arab children. Preface xiii The school addresses the difficulties inherent in an encounter between two populations involved in a protracted political, social, cultural and religious conflict. It offers a way to contain the dispute while enabling the children to engage in a real encounter with the culture of the other.