Most visits to Israel/Palestine stay on the beaten path. These suggestions can help policymakers and members of the public gain a greater understanding of the conflict, and to witness first-hand the work of Israeli and Palestinian peacebuilders to bring about a just and lasting resolution to the conflict.
Delegations from the U.S. to Israel/Palestine
Christian Peacemaker Teams (Palestine)
CPT is a faith-based organization that supports nonviolent Palestinian resistance to the Israeli occupation, while advocating for justice and peace. They offer the opportunity to visit with human rights workers in Palestine, to meet with individuals affected by the occupation and to engage in nonviolent public witness.
Contact: (773) 376-0550 / peacemakers@cpt.org
Friends of Sabeel
Friends of Sabeel is a movement started by Christian Palestinians advocating for a two-state solution and peace between Israel and Palestine. They offer alternative travel to visit Christian Holy Land sites, as well as witness the realities of political and military occupation.
Contact: (503) 653-6625 / friends@fosna.org
Global Exchange
Global Exchange offers multiple travel options including a fact-finding delegation to expose the realities of occupation, an educational experience learning fair trade cooperatives between Israel and Palestine, and an examination of the impact of the occupation on the environment in Palestine.
Contact: (415) 255-7296 / web@globalexchange.org
Interfaith Peacebuilders
Interfaith Peacebuilders’ delegations meet with representatives from Palestine and Israel to discuss nonviolent solutions to the conflict and powerful, productive ways to end the occupation.
Contact: (202) 244-0821 / office@ifpb.org
Neighbors East and West
Neighbors East and West began when two Quakers, Sam and Ruth Neff, began organizing visits from Indiana to the Soviet Union during the Cold War. In recent years, Neighbors East and West has organized visits to Iran and Israel/Palestine.
Contact: (406) 862-1629 / samn@earlham.edu
Tour Groups in Israel and Palestine
Alternative Tours
Alternative Tours offers half day and full day tours of a West Bank refugee camp, Jerusalem, Hebron, Bethlehem, Jericho, Nazareth, Qalqilya and the Dead Sea.
Contact Abu Hassan: 0522-864205 / abuhasan@alqudsnet.com
Alternative Tourism Group Palestine
Alternative Tourism Group offers tours and pilgrimages that include a strong emphasis on the history, culture and politics of the Holy Land.
Contact: +972-2-2772151 / info@atg.ps
Breaking the Silence
Breaking the Silence is a group of ex-soldiers who share what they did and saw while serving in Hebron. Their half-day tours also include conversations with Palestinian families who are affected by the settler and soldier violence.
Contact: info@breakingthesilence.org.il
Hanthala Tours
Hanthala Tours offers full day tours of the Old City of Hebron, refugee camps and the South Hebron Hills. They can also arrange home stays and cultural exchanges for tourists.
Contact: 0599.271.190 / h_sharabati@hotmail.com
Holy Land Trust
Holy Land Trust offers a variety of alternative travel including Christian and spiritual pilgrimages, olive harvesting and cuisine tours, home rebuilding experience, and volunteering missions.
Contact: +970-2-2765930 / encounter@holylandtrust.org
Ir Amim
Ir Amim offers tours of Jerusalem that discuss Israeli policy in Jerusalem since 1967, including the socio-economic and political implications of that policy on Israelis and Palestinians.
Contact: +972-2-6233973 / studytours@ir-amim.org.il
The Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions
ICAHD offers half-day tours of East Jerusalem, including the Wall, settlements and home demolitions.
Contact: +972-50-7750754 / tours@icahd.org
Jerusalem Reality Tours
Jerusalem Reality Tours offers half-, full- and multi-day tours around Jerusalem, showing diverse communities including refugees, settlers, Beduin, and Mizrahi Jews.
Contact: +972-0-523634370 / jerusalemrealitytours@gmail.com
Siraj Center
Siraj Center offers numerous travel experiences, including youth exchange programs, Christian Holy Land programs, cultural and historical programs, and host family programs.
Contact: +972-2-274-8590 / info@sirajcenter.org
The Telos Group
Telos Groups offers a variety of tours including highly-personalized VIP tours, intensive cultural educational experiences, Holy Land pilgrimages and more.
Contact: +202-552-9661 / info@telosgroup.org
For more tour group options, check out Just Vision’s extensive list.
Peace-Building Organizations
Al Aqaba (Through the Rebuilding Alliance)
The Rebuilding Alliance is working to rebuild homes in the village of Al Aqaba that were destroyed by Israeli military occupation.
Contact: +1-650-325-4663 / contact@rebuildingalliance.org
Al-Haq
Al-Haq is an NGO in the West Bank dedicated to ensuring human rights in Palestine. They work to document human rights violations and to bring the violators to justice.
Contact: +972-2-2954646/7/9 / contact form.
American Friends Service Committee - Palestine
AFSC works in Palestine to support youth in meeting local humanitarian, economic, social and educational needs.
B’Tselem - The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories
B’Tselem works to document Israeli human rights violations in Palestine and to educate the Israeli public about these events, in order to transform the widespread phenomenon of denial in Israel.
Contact: +972-2-6735599 / mail@btselem.org
Combatants for Peace
This organization is part of a movement founded by former Israeli and Palestinian military. These individuals who once were part of the cycle of violence decided that they must be influential actors in the fight for peace.
Ramallah Friends Meeting
The Ramallah Friends School is a leading educational institution in the Palestinian community. The Lower School and the Upper School were founded in 1869 and 1901 respectively, for the purpose of offering Palestinian youth a rigorous program guided by Quaker principles.
Central to Quaker education is a vitality that comes from being a living expression of a religious life. Over the last century, the School has experienced Turkish, British, Jordanian, and Israeli occupation, world wars, and closures. The Friends School, in its checkered political history, has served not only as schools, but also as a center for refugees, hospital, and a center for community lectures, concerts and other cultural activities.
Meeting for Worship every Sunday at 10:30 am; For information on additional meetings, events, discussions and gatherings please contact us at info.rfmq@gmail. com.
972-2-297-1314
PO Box 1325
Ramallah
West Bank, Palestine
Hand in Hand
Hand in Hand works to build peace, partnership and equality through a network of integrated, bilingual schools and shared communities of children, youth and adults throughout Israel.
Contact U.S. Headquarters: 503-892-2962 / info@handinhandk12.org.
Hebron Rehabilitation Committee
HRC is committed to preserving the cultural integrity of Hebron, renovating cultural and historical sites and upgrading the buildings and infrastructure of the Old City.
Contact: +97-02-2226994/3 / hebronrc@hebronet.com
Mossawa Center: The Advocacy Center for Arab Citizens in Israel
The Mossawa Center works to promote social, political economic equality for the 1.3 million Arab citizens of Israel, while also preserving and maintaining strong cultural ties to their Palestinian heritage.
Contact: +972-4-855-5901
Parents Circle Families Forum
Parents Circle Families Forum brings together both Israelis and Palestinians who have lost loved ones due to the decades-long conflict. By engaging both sides in joint activities, they encourage a process of reconciliation.
Contact
- Israeli Office: +03-535-5080 / office@theparentscircle.org
- Palestinian Office: +02-275-5180 / alquds@theparentcircle.org
Rabbis for Human Rights
Rabbis for Human Rights gives a voice to the Jewish tradition of human rights, by championing the rights of the poor and the minorities in Israel and the Palestinians, promote the equal status of women, and more.
Peace Now: Israel (Tel Aviv and Jerusalem Branches)
Peace Now represents the Israeli public who are advocating for peace between Israel and Palestine. They have worked to engage both Palestine and the international community in dialogue to further the peace process.
Contact
- General Email: info@peacenow.org.il
- Tel Aviv Branch: +972-3-6023300 / chen@peacenow.org.il
- Jerusalem Branch: +972-2-5660648 / Danielle@peacenow.org.il
Ramallah Friends School
Ramallah Friends School is a primary and secondary educational institution in Ramallah.
Contact: +970-2-295-2286 E / jumanathalji@rfs.edu.ps
Tent of Nations
Tent of Nations brings together youth from all over the world, specifically from conflict regions, to work on a farm that is threatened to be taken over by the Israeli government.
Contact: +972-2-274-3071 / contact form.
For more peacebuilding organizations in the region, check out Just Vision’s extensive list.
Oasis of Peace
Wahat al-Salam – Neve Shalom (pronounced “waaḥat’ as-salaam/nevei shalom”) is Arabic and Hebrew for Oasis of Peace: an intentional community jointly established by Jewish and Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel. The village is located midway between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv-Jaffa.
Visit Wahat al-Salam – Neve Shalom’s Primary School, the first bilingual, binational school in Israel, its Peace Museum and Oasis Art Gallery for Palestinian and Jewish artists, its Pluralistic Spiritual Center and Doumia, and its internationally acclaimed School for Peace.
Contact: +02 9996305 / rita@nswas.info
Youth Against Settlements
Youth Against Settlements is a nonviolent Palestinian organization based in the West Bank city of Hebron that seeks to end the building and expansion of illegal Israeli settlements through non-violent popular struggle and civil resistance.
Contact: 970 568 887 711 / media.yas@gmail.com
Adalah
Adalah (“Justice” in Arabic) is an independent human rights organization and legal center. Its mission is to promote human rights in Israel in general and the rights of the Palestinian minority, citizens of Israel, in particular (around 1.5 million people, or 20% of the population).
Contact: (972)-4-9501610 / adalah@adalah.org
Palestinian Medical Relief Society
Palestinian Medical Relief Society (PMRS) is a grassroots community-based Palestinian health organization. PMRS was founded in 1979 by a group of Palestinian doctors and health professionals seeking to supplement the decayed and inadequate health infrastructure caused by years of Israeli military occupation.
Contact: 970-2-2969970 / pmrs@pmrs.ps
Healing Across the Divides
Healing Across the Divides measurably improves the health of marginalized people of all backgrounds (religious, ethnic, racial and any other) in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories, via community-based interventions. It offers an annual ten-day study tour in March, in which participants meet grassroots health-care and other community leaders, visit program grantees to learn about the physical and mental health challenges faced, and gain understanding of the region through the dual narrative of Jewish and Palestinian guides.
Contact: norbert@healingdivides.org