The Environmental Cooperation and Israel-Palestinian Peace event will take place March 15 at 1pm at 280A 91ÑÇÉ« Lanes, Keele campus.

Environmental cooperation has been much-lauded as a force of peace in the Middle East and has been leveraged in support of Track I peacemaking processes between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. It has been pursued as a practice of peace-building, valued for its ability to foster partnership-building, cooperation, identity change and sustainability. Still, the Israel-Palestinian conflict persists, even manifesting through cooperative environmental relations.

±Ê²¹²Ô±ð±ô±ô¾±²õ³Ù²õÌý (right), an international development, peace-building and dialogue researcher-practitioner, and Stuart Schoenfeld (left), chair of the Department of Sociology at 91ÑÇɫ’s Glendon College, will present and discuss the issue. Drawing on their direct experience of working with practitioners, governments and stakeholders in the Middle East, they will critically examine assumptions and practices of environmental cooperation between Israel and the Palestinians. Abitbol and Schoenfeld co-chaired the AVOW initiative (Adaptive Visions of Water in the Middle East), hosted at IRIS from 2007-2009.

Abitbol specializes in hydropolitical issues, with a particular interest in Israeli-Palestinian relations. A Chevening Scholar and associate Fellow at IRIS, he is pursuing a PhD in peace studies at the University of Bradford in the United Kingdom, while teaching university courses at the nexus of environment and peace. As a consultant, he recently conducted the Conflict and Peace Effects Study of the Israel-Palestinian Authority-Jordan-World Bank "Red Sea Dead Sea Conveyance" initiative.

Schoenfeld's research on regional environmentalism in the Middle East began in the late 1990s. A network of Israelis, Palestinians and Jordanians began to work towards a common understanding of issues of water, energy, waste, transportation, consumption, biodiversity and sustainable development, and to fashion a way of turning that common understanding into one of the elements for peace and human security in the region.

The project continues to investigate this network and other regional frameworks. The project has produced publications on transboundary environmental networks, environmental peace building, approaches to regional environmental governance and the role of empathy in environmental peace-building.

For more information, visit the website.

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Non-violent revolutions don't happen overnight. It is only in the last stage – as we saw in Egypt, or in the peaceful overthrow of many governments in Eastern Europe – that they seem spontaneous – maybe even inevitable.

One place where the revolution is still very much in the making is along the fault lines between Israelis and Palestinians, where many individuals and groups, in their own way, are committed to non-violence in many different forms.

It includes a very quiet initiative by a group of Canadians. CISEPO, founded by Mount Sinai's Dr. Arnie Noyek, is now headed by Dr. Harvey Skinner, dean of health at 91ÑÇÉ«. Call them the Quiet Canadians.

The (CISEPO) doesn't hold rallies, or put up posters. Instead the group holds academic meetings and publishes papers in academic journals, like The Lancet. They've built cooperation between these very different groups through projects with universal appeal, like an infant heath screening program.

"A lot of cooperation occurs," says Skinner. "But it occurs very quietly. If we can, as Canadians, create an umbrella for (Israeli and Palestinian) colleagues to meet and then do this again and again, it's doing a little a lot. If you sit across a table, you find out we have more in common, especially those of us who are in health, and it can build over time, respect, trust, co-operation. And we keep doing this again and again."

"We're building what we call a network of co-operation. Doing it quietly. Not front page in the media. Nothing's bleeding here, right? You get a terrorist attack in the region, instantly you get press. We hold a meeting like this – quite remarkable. Not even that much interest in the press."

°Õ³ó±ðÌý of the full report runs 6 minutes 27 seconds.

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This afternoon, from 2 to 4pm at the at the Munk School at the University of Toronto, 91ÑÇÉ« political science Professor (right) will be among a select group of panellists addressing these political shifts and the implications of the "Arab spring" from regional perspectives. Themes for discussion include, humanitarian intervention, nuclear weapons, non-violence and democracy. The panellists:

Emanuel Adler will speak on "The Israeli perspective on Transformation in the Middle East". Adler is professor of International Relations in the Department of Political Science at the University of Toronto, Andrea & Charles Bronfman Chair of Israeli Studies, and editor of International Organization.

Adler's interests include the international politics of identity and peace, rationality and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a constructivist reconsideration of strategic logic, including deterrence in post-Cold War international security, the role of practice in international relations, European security institutions, and international relations theory in particular, constructivism, epistemic communities and security communities.

Ramin Jahanbegloo will talk about "Civil Society and the Transformation in the Middle East". Jahanbegloo is an Iranian-Canadian philosopher. He taught in the Department of Political Science at the University of Toronto from 1997-2001 and later served as the head of the Department of Contemporary Studies of the Cultural Research Centre in Tehran. In 2006-2007, Jahanbegloo was the Rajni Kothari Professor of Democracy at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies in New Delhi, India. In April 2006, he was arrested in Tehran Airport charged with preparing a velvet revolution in Iran. He was placed in solitary confinement for four months and released on bail. He is presently a professor of political science and a research fellow in the Centre for Ethics at University of Toronto and a board member of PEN Canada.

In October 2009, Jahanbegloo became the winner of the Peace Prize from the United Nations Association in Spain for his extensive academic works in promoting dialogue between cultures and his advocacy for non-violence.

Saeed Rahnema will present "The View from Iran towards Transformation in the Middle East". Rahnema is professor of political science at 91ÑÇÉ«. He has served as the director of the School of Public Policy & Administration and coordinator of the political science program in the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies. Prior to joining 91ÑÇÉ«, he was a professor in the School of Policy Studies at Queen’s University. In his homeland of Iran, he taught and worked as a member of the executive of the Industrial Management Institute in Tehran. He is a frequent commentator on Canadian and international media on the issues of the Middle East and Islam, Human Rights, and Left and Labour Movement, and has published several books and numerous articles in English and Farsi (Persian).

He was cited in the ²Ñ²¹³¦±ô±ð²¹²Ô’s Guide to Canadian Universities as a "most popular" professor in 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2005. He won the 91ÑÇÉ« Teaching Excellence Award in 2004. In 2007, he won the Government of Ontario’s Leadership in Faculty Teaching Award.

Janice Stein is the Belzberg Professor of Conflict Management in the Department of Political Science and the director of the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Toronto. She is a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and a member of the Order of Canada and the Order of Ontario. Her most recent publications include Networks of Knowledge: Innovation in International Learning (2000); The Cult of Efficiency (2001); and Street Protests and Fantasy Parks (2001). She is a contributor to Canada by Picasso (2006) and the co-author of The Unexpected War: Canada in Kandahar (2007).

Stein was the Massey Lecturer in 2001 and a Trudeau Fellow. She was awarded the Molson Prize by the Canada Council for an outstanding contribution by a social scientist to public debate. She is an Honorary Foreign Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Space is limited. Organizers ask that those interested in attending RSVP to rsvp@utapss.ca.

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The teach-in will take place Thursday, Feb. 10, at 2:30pm at 2183 Vari Hall, Keele campus, with 91ÑÇÉ« history Professor Thabit Abdullah, political science Professor , equity studies professors and Nadia Habib.

Abdullah is the author of , and the co-editor of .

Right: Nadia Habib

A human rights lecturer, Habib was one of the top 10 finalists in TVOntario’s 2010 Big Ideas Best Lecturer Competition. Her research focus is on Egyptian cultural life, but she has also directed, produced and performed in live theatre, and is a poet and activist. She continues to be involved in creative projects and wrote and participated in the narration of A Hot Sand Filled Wind, the third instalment of b.h. Yael's film, .

Left: Haideh Moghissi

Moghissi is the author of , which was translated and reprinted in 2010 by a South Korean publisher, and co-editor of , which explores issues of race and ethnicity, culture, media, gender and migration. In 2009, she published a monograph, , co-authored by 91ÑÇÉ« political science professors Rahnema and Mark Goodman.

Right: Saeed Rahnema

Rahnema won the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities’ Leadership in Faculty Teaching Award in 2007, the 91ÑÇÉ«-Wide Teaching Excellence Award in 2004 and was named most popular professor at 91ÑÇÉ« four years in a row by ²Ñ²¹³¦±ô±ð²¹²Ô’s Magazine's Guide to Canadian Universities. He is author of , Re-birth of Social Democracy in Iran (Baran Books Verlag, 1996) and co-author of Selected Communities of Islamic Cultures in Canada: A Statistical Profile, Diaspora, Islam and Gender Project (2005).

The event is sponsored by the and the Middle Eastern Student Association at 91ÑÇÉ« U.

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