PEACE with Penny SEASON 3: Penny S. Tee Interviews Jamal Alkirnawi, Founder and Executive Director of A New Dawn in the Negev March 29, 2022
In Tuesday’s episode, we spoke with Jamal Alkirnawi, the Founder and Executive Director of A New Dawn in the Negev. The organization is a manifestation of Jamal’s desire to raise the level of education for the Bedouin community in Israel’s Negev region. According to government reports, “the Bedouin population of the Negev is the poorest sector in Israel, suffering from a lack of infrastructure and quality education.” Bedouins are also the youngest population in Israel. 80% of the Bedouin community are under age 16!
A New Dawn in the Negev is an Arab-Jewish community development organization based in Rahat, Israel, where they promote education, employment, and leadership. They work together with other NGOs to promote unity, peace and understanding. They have many creative programs between Jewish Israelis and the Bedouin community concentrating on educational, cultural and international activities, including partnerships between Israeli towns and Bedouin villages, emphasizing support for schools, and innovative programming like the Sarab-Strings of Change music programs, the Explore Rahat – Cultural Tourism program and international student exchanges bringing Bedouin Israeli, Jewish Israeli and German youth together participating in dialogue circles and field trips to sites of significance to one another’s history. The field trips include the teens traveling together to the Holocaust memorial sites in Germany, as well as sites in Rahat and Jerusalem.
We hope you will listen to these amazing stories as A New Dawn in the Negev works on Peace in the Bedouin community with Jewish Israelis. There is hope. Come learn about the unique characteristics and challenges of the Bedouin community in the Negev. Resolving these issues will result in benefits for the Bedouin community as well as all of Israel.
We pray that Everyone will some day Live in Peace, שלום and سلام.