Hello. My name is Yalda Dehghan, and I am a participant of Abraham’s Vision from ICCNC. Before entering the Unity Program, I didn’t know much about the Jewish faith. I initially signed up for the program so that I would be able to create a better understanding of it. But throughout the curriculum, I ended up learning much more than that. Not only did I learn about the Jewish religion, but I learned more about my own. I realized that the two were much more alike than I had imagined. In fact, a lot of the things we learned about the Jewish faith sounded familiar to us, as they had been things we had learned about in our own religion. Aside from religion, we learned about communication and conflict resolution, which is something that I am sure all of us will put to use in the future. One of my favorite aspects about the program was how our education was expanded beyond the boundaries of the classroom. Field trips, guest speakers, and meetings with the other schools made up a large part of the curriculum. It’s one thing to learn about a religion through a textbook. It’s a completely different thing to interact with members of that religion, and to listen to their point of view. Overall, the Unity program was an experience I’ll never forget, and I am very happy that I was able to be a part of it.

-Yalda Dehghan

Learning to Understand:
As a young American, I am surrounded by different ideas, cultures, and beliefs. I constantly work and interact with people from different backgrounds, yet I never truly understood the significance of understanding others until I joined Abraham's Vision. Coming into Abraham’s Vision, I felt my purpose was to teach others about my views and ideas so that they may understand me, yet I never thought to learn from others. I learned that even if I am approached by ideas that go against my belief system, I still have complete respect for the individual and their eagerness to share and learn like myself. This was completely unfathomable to me before I started Abraham's Vision, yet I have my program coordinators, passionate teachers, and fellow students to thank for allowing me to understand that listening and learning from others is the first step to breaking down barriers. I learned that the Muslim and Jewish faith and traditions are amazingly similar, and what divides us is the lack of understanding that AV has helped us to combat. Even if there are politics abroad that may try to divide us, there will be no change until our communities come together with acceptance. We must think globally, but act locally. Abraham's Vision has helped me understand that in order to break down barriers, we must be eager to learn from and share ideas with others, and only when people come together will we bring peace and justice to the world.

-Dania Din

As I fill out the application to get into this program I think about a time where I have actually been in contact with a Muslim or at the most even talked to one.

This past summer I travelled to Israel and met the Bedouins in their tents. They identify themselves as Muslims but welcomed us Jews into their community and village. We ate a huge meal and heard the history of how Bedouins came to be.

When I started Abraham’s Vision there were many fears floating in my head. I started questioning whether or not we would get along, how us Jews would react to a different culture, and if we would ever touch intimate topics. At the first meeting within Midrasha, Samantha and Yasmeen asked each individual to share why they applied to Abrahams Vision. Many responses were, “I would love to learn about a different culture”. Another was, “My family never really discusses the conflict between Palestine and Israel and I would like to touch on it and learn more.”

The first connection I made in this program was with a fellow student, her name was Yasi. She was the first student to open up and listen to our opinions as a whole. After that connection I felt more comfortable to reach out and state what I had to say. For the next couple meetings the group expanded and discussed various topics such as breaking down a stereotype, racial profiling in airports and the “hottest”, the opinions on the Israel/Palestine conflict.

During the last inter-school meeting in SF the floor was open to anyone who wanted questions answered that hadn’t throughout the experience. We were given pieces of paper and most wrote something. The conflict in Israel/Palestine was still not broken down so I decided to address it for the last time. Our 5 hour session had turned into a policy institute. This experience has taught me not to judge other groups, not to make stereotypical assumptions and that my opinion always matters!

As I write in the last word my mind makes images of us all getting along no matter race, sex or
age. I wish that was true in real life but in Abraham’s Vision it did work.

-Sara Geliebter

I joined Midrasha this year to do the Abraham’s Vision program. I first heard about the Abraham’s Vision program when my mom got a flyer about it. It sounded like a gift from heaven. I’ll tell you now, I’m the only kid in my group of friends who can talk about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict nonstop. I was so happy to finally find people who I can talk to about this topic. AV has been a dream come true, it has given me a chance to dialogue about this topic which I feel so strongly about. Meeting the Muslim students helped me put a human face on the people I too easily thought of as the enemy. The program helped me get over my initial tribal anger at violence towards Jews and helped me separate the majority of Muslims from the actions of a few extremists. I have amazing memories about all of us having constructive and non-confrontational talks about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict itself. The program has helped me understand the conflict which I am so interested in by helping me see the conflict from an outside and non partisan perspective. AV has given me a deeper understanding about conflicts and how to approach them, teaching me lessons that have helped me in all aspects of my life. I have met people that I never would have met and I will carry the experiences from this program for the rest of my life. Also I would like to thank Samantha, Yasmeen, Huda, and Aaron for making this program possible.

-Owen Hall

Equality is fundamental to the DNA of those who call the Bay Area home. If we can’t embrace tolerance, no one can. I am proud to say that no participant from either side came to the program with intolerance. I didn’t expect them to. But while we were tolerant of each other, I can only speak for myself when I say that I was not accepting of the other in the sense that I felt that rather than being two different groups working together, we were two different groups locked in competition.

What changed me were the hours upon hours listening to the stories of the Jewish students. Their stories shocked me not by their extremity, but just how similar to my own. I remember one specific conversation amongst the Jewish students where they were discussing their faith’s sense of modesty. I remember thinking that you could take that exact conversation and drop it into a gathering of Muslims.

There are several stimuli for unity in a society, unity enzymes if you will: A common enemy, a common goal, and a common belief. In the past year with the unity program, the Muslim and Jewish students have benefited from all three:

Our common enemy – hatred between our communities
Our common goal – Peace in our own societies and in the Holy Land
Our common belief – the peace that defined the life of our common patriarch, Abraham.

-Faisal Hamid