Tech2Peace

Tomer Cohen is the Co-Founder and Director of Tech2Peace. 

Tomer formerly founded the youth branch of a major Israeli grassroots peace movement, "Israel Hofsheet," or "Be Free Israel," which "strives for an Israeli society that practices cultural and religious pluralism, protects civil rights, and upholds the principles of democracy and Zionism as put forth in the Declaration of Independence." During this time, Tomer led many campaigns, for example: fighting to stop the incitement against Arabs in Jewish society, resisting the exclusion of women in the public domain, etc.

Before his mandatory Israeli army service, Tomer helped establish the “Snowball Project”, which aimed to connect Israelis and Palestinians through informal meetings. Meanwhile, Tomer was the fundraising manager in “The Green Movement,” a social-environmental party. After the military, Tomer volunteered in the office of Knesset Member Yael Cohen Paran.

Young Palestinians and Israelis grow up not knowing, and often demonizing, the "other." Existing peace initiatives in Israel-Palestine and around the world commonly fail to create strong, lasting bonds. Furthermore, young people in marginalized areas of Palestine-Israel and other parts of the world struggle to gain access to the growing high-tech sector.

Tech2Peace hosts two-week long technology training and dialogue seminars where young Israelis and Palestinians build strong, empathetic relationships and learn technological/entrepreneurial skills. Relationships are maintained through ongoing community interactions.

Our model, leveraging technology in the pursuit of peace, has been proven to build relationships and understanding in ways that traditional dialogue does not, while at the same time providing economic opportunities.

There are current plans for our model to be replicated in South Africa by MIT MISTI. This model applies across conflicts around the world.

(1) Ethnic conflict - Although Palestinians and Israelis live close to each other, very few opportunities for positive interactions exist. Thus Israelis and Palestinians hardly know each other and may have a negative image of one other. This helps to reinforce and widen the conflict. 

(2) Youth unemployment - In Palestine and in the Israeli periphery, young people find it hard to find employment opportunities and to dream of a successful career. Young people in conflict regions, who do not believe in their ability to have a bright future, may experience frustration, which can lead to radicalization. 

(3) Lack of effective peacebuilding activities - There are a general lack of global peacebuilding activities. Furthermore, most existing peacebuilding activities simply bring the two parties together to talk about big issues, without building trust by working towards shared goals, creating community through co-living and social activities, or fostering continued engagement. Other peacebuilding activities feature work towards shared goals without dialogue, leaving issues as "elephants in the room."

(4) Shortage of high-tech workers - The global high-tech sector constantly has need for new, skilled employees. However, it is difficult to break into the high-tech sector, especially for those from the global socio-geographic periphery.

T2P hosts two-week long, residential seminars for young Palestinians and Israelis, blending technology / entrepreneurship training, conflict dialogue, and social activities, along with continued community-building events post-seminar. 

Most peace initiatives engage the same groups of left-wing activists, and create weak bonds: through simple dialogue, or through working towards shared goals without dialogue.

T2P participants build strong relationships through: 

• working together towards shared goals of learning technological skills and completing projects; 

• getting to know each other through co-living and social activities; and 

• learning about each other's perspectives in a trusting environment through conflict mediation sessions. 

T2P draws diverse participants, especially those from peripheral areas, who are interested in learning technological skills, going beyond the typical groups involved in peace initiatives. And T2P helps maintain group bonds by curating ongoing community events and interactions, like a recent panel and meetup at WeWork Tel Aviv, a T2P partner.

Lastly, T2P participants gain access to economic opportunities through: 

• new and valuable skills - both soft, like team-work and project management, and technical, like website development and 3D design; 

• interactions and lectures with industry professionals and mentors; 

• advanced entrepreneurial trainings and opportunities provided by Google for Startups and 50-50 Startups

• curated internship and job opportunities

Israelis and Palestinians reaching adult age today cannot remember a time when there was real hope for peace, and grew up with the traumas of the intifadas and subsequent conflicts. Palestinians and Israelis live geographically and culturally separated from one another, isolated by tangible and intangible borders. Even Israeli Jews and Arabs rarely know each other - most receive separate educations and there are only a handful of “mixed” Arab and Jewish cities in Israel. Under these conditions of separation, harmful stereotypes and misinformation flourish between the two sides.

Additionally, there is a lack of access to meaningful employment opportunities in the Israeli periphery, the Palestinian territories, and Israeli-Arab society. Young people in conflict regions, who do not believe in their ability to have a bright future, may experience frustration, which can lead to radicalization.

We provide the opportunity for young Palestinians and Israelis to meet each other in a secure context; to work with each towards shared goals; to build friendships through social activities; and to gain meaningful opportunities in tech and entrepreneurship.

We currently have over 400 applicants from Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank for 60 spots in our summer 2020 seminars. The demand is huge. 

The core of our mission is to create strong, empathetic relationships amongst conflicting groups. We believe that we take an innovative approach to this, both through the use of technology in peacebuilding, and through a multi-faceted peacebuilding methodology utilizing both shared goals, dialogue, and community-building. Utilizing technology in peacebuilding is especially beneficial as it allows us to recruit participants from outside the traditional "peace camp." Evaluations have shown our model is effective in building empathetic relationships, and our model is now in the process of being replicated around the world. We additionally provide economic opportunity for marginalized populations.

I grew up in a right-wing Israeli Jewish family, but started attending Israeli-Palestinian peace camps as I got older. In every camp I made great friendships, but after the programs finished, the friendships would disappear. Additionally, every year, most participants tended to be from the same liberal circles. 

During my mandatory military service, I was a combat officer in a technological warfare unit, using technology to defend my country in the 2014 Gaza War. But as war was waged around me, I often thought to myself, "why can't we use this technology to wage peace and build bridges instead?"

I realized that technology can fix the problems of the peace camps by giving diverse Israelis and Palestinians life skills and shared goals, which enable them to build strong relationships, continue working together, and achieve material success. And I realized the relationships formed during technological training could also be better maintained through strong community-building. So as a university student, in partnership with two seasoned mediators, I launched Tech2Peace.

Please see above.

My experience in peace camps growing up was highly impactful on me. I was so optimistic after every summer that there was hope in this conflict. But time after time, the relationships fell away, and the peace camps led to almost nothing.

Like most Palestinians and Israelis, I am sick of this conflict. I am sick of the death, of the human rights violations, and of people feeling there is an unknown enemy, living so close but so far. I have little faith in the political process. We must do what we can at the grassroots level.

What I have seen in Tech2Peace is nothing short of spectacular. Young Palestinians and Israelis, many of whom are not traditional "peaceniks" - religious, right-wingers, conservative - coming together, building friendships, learning tech skills and creating amazing joint projects, and maintaining bonds long after the program - creating an alumni community for themselves full of amazing content. Our alumni are also going on to create and pitch start-ups together through 50-50 Startups in Boston, opening the possibility for joint Israeli-Palestinian ventures that embed peace in the economy. It is nothing short of amazing.

My co-founders - Abeer, who is Arab, and Uri, who is Jewish - are conflict mediators with over a decade of experience co-facilitating an Israeli-Palestinian mediation group called Yad b'Yad, which has had immense success in breaking down barriers among 150 people young people that meet once a month. Uri also spent more than a decade as a project manager in the high-tech industry.

Uri, Abeer, and I met as co-facilitators at an international youth camp in Holland. We immediately began discussing how to improve on our past experiences with peace initiatives - them with Yad b'Yad, and me with peace camps.

Uri and Abeer are primarily responsible for developing and implementing the conflict mediation curriculum, as well as generally managing group relations. I utilize my leadership experience from different movements and the army to manage Tech2Peace as a whole, especially focusing on logistics and fundraising.

Tech2Peace has thus far been run on a largely volunteer basis, while I study in university and my co-founders work in other jobs. We manage an often-shifting group of volunteers, sometimes meaning we need to quickly pivot to fill roles and re-train staff. Despite the challenges of working with a mostly-volunteer organization and managing Tech2Peace while in university, Tech2Peace has taken off and had immediate success, winning the Israeli President's "Israel Hope" award and receiving international recognition (e.g.: https://www.bbc.com/news/business-48053200?fbclid=IwAR0YuC79KuwPZinmawSjb7LTbtqw-yA2NASRiBC2AkZspAi-ryxpuFnqXIc)

Another challenge was securing permits for Palestinians to enter Israel for the seminars. Many peacebuilding activities in Israel-Palestine lack cross-border engagement as securing permits is notoriously difficult. We spent months meeting a series of government officials in order to secure these permits. 

I formerly founded the youth branch of a major Israeli grassroots peace movement, "Israel Hofsheet," or "Be Free Israel," which "strives for an Israeli society that practices cultural and religious pluralism, protects civil rights, and upholds the principles of democracy and Zionism as put forth in the Declaration of Independence." During this time, I led many campaigns and protests, for example: fighting to stop the incitement against Arabs in Jewish society, resisting the exclusion of women in the public domain, etc.

Before my mandatory Israeli army service, I helped establish the “Snowball Project”, which aimed to connect Israelis and Palestinians through informal meetings. Meanwhile, I was the fundraising manager in “The Green Movement,” a social-environmental party. 

In the army, I managed soldiers and technological systems in sensitive battlefield situations.

After the military, I volunteered in the office of Knesset Member Yael Cohen Paran.

1. Many peacebuilding activities involve bringing groups together to discuss “big” issues. However, research shows that social cohesion is more effectively built through mutual action towards shared goals. Tech2Peace participants build social cohesion through working together to learn technological skills and complete group projects.

2. Some peacebuilding activities bring groups together over shared goals, but do not provide conflict mediation workshops or skills. This can lead to group conflict, as the natural conflicts that occur in teams are exacerbated by pre-existing circumstances. Tech2Peace provides conflict mediation workshops along with actions towards shared goals. 

3. Too many peacebuilding activities are one-off programs that fail to have impact past the immediate action. One Tech2Peace co-founder grew up in Israeli-Palestinian peace camps, but found that friendships made during camp disappeared soon after. Tech2Peace builds and maintains a strong community through seminar activities and post-seminar engagement. 

If Arab and Jews from different communities who have a common interest in hi-tech career opportunities join the intensive seminars, study and work together on innovative projects, then it will create a good basis for discussions and mutual assistance, while facing challenges, and celebrating success. These interactions will deepen the relationships and trust between them. Furthermore, being together under the same roof for two intensive weeks, eating, sleeping, spending time together, having experiences with people they wouldn’t have otherwise met, then new friendships will be built which will inspire to further cooperate. 40% of the time in the seminar is dedicated to guided dialogue sessions. If Arabs and Jews be guided through a structured intensive dialogue which touches upon the conflict and the different narratives in a supportive environment, with other fun activities, then they will not only deepen their awareness to the other, reduce prejudice and fear, but also acquire the tools to facilitate dialogues in their communities and become empowered independent agents of change beyond the program timeline. At the end of the seminar, participants join T2P alumni who meet bi-monthly and its members volunteer in T2P initiatives. If participants meet regularly with the extended T2P Alumni, then the professional and social network will further expand, deepening mutual trust, friendship, and partnerships. This will lead to a shared society when it is only natural to work, and dream together. To sum up, P2P meetings which are based on common interest have proven to hold a sustainable effect on the attitudes of groups in conflicts. If we add to this emphasis on open dialogue on the conflict and on the challenges of living in a shared society, we have a greater potential of accelerating and deepening the process and have a brighter prosperous future to these young adults and the society as a whole. 

Past two years: 90 direct beneficiaries, with expanding (butterfly) impact. (80% of participants have stated that they would share concepts learned in Tech2Peace with their trusted circles)

This year: 90 direct beneficiaries

Next year: 150 direct beneficiaries

Five years: 280 direct beneficiaries

We aim to simultaneously expand our work inside Israel while also expanding around the world. We aim to create closer partnerships with the private sector in order to engrain peace into the global economy. We aim to support our alumni as they build joint Israeli-Palestinian ventures together. To these ends, we are:

• • planning short seminars with Google for Startups, combining entrepreneurship training with conflict resolution.

  • planning a 6-7 day seminar in collaboration with MIT, teaching a tool they have developed: MIT App Inventor. 

  • in discussion with two companies - Microsoft and Cisco, who are both interested in creating a longer training session (once a week, for a few months) - we will bring the dialogue element, and these companies will give the tech part.

  • planning an advanced alumni seminar in Switzerland, along with a Swiss NGO called Coexistances. This 9-10 day long seminar will include advanced dialogue, lectures from Swiss experts in conflict resolution, and planning the next years.

  • partnering with another Swiss NGO, Verein Naturkultur, in which Israelis, Palestinians, and Swiss (local and migrant youth) will go through a Tech2Peace-like seminar. We are also in contact with an NGO from Kosovo regarding the same concept.

• More alumni events - online and offline: we will have events on a monthly basis in Israel and Palestine. Some of these events will be on tech, some on conflict-resolution, some will be open to the larger public, and some will be only for our community or our alumni only.

We have immense demand for our work - over 400 applicants currently for 60 available spots. We do not have the financial capacity to meet this demand. We are a non-profit organization operating mostly on a volunteer basis - we are limited from hiring more people by our fundraising abilities, and limited from fundraising by our inability to hire more people. A boost of capital can help us significantly expand.

The Elevate Prize will provide us attention and resources greatly needed to start the positive feedback growth process of expansion. The Elevate Prize would also allow us to invest in joint Israeli-Palestinian startups created by our alumni - allowing us to grow exponentially and create a more sustainable impact.

We believe strongly in working with like-minded partners in the governmental, business, and civil society sectors in order to magnify shared impact, build an ecosystem around tech and peace, and bring added value to our work. 

Examples of our partnerships include: We receive technology trainers from MISTI (MIT International Science and Technology Initiatives) and guest lecturers from Microsoft Israel. Google for Startups provides a two-day entrepreneurship training within our seminars. 50-50 Startups, an incubator program from Boston, Massachusetts, offers incubation and investment opportunities for projects started by our alumni. Regus and WeWork have provided us office space. The Yeruham and Nazareth Municipalities graciously host us in their respective cities.

We are a non-profit organization. We measure our impact along the following outline:

Goal: We aim to build a strong community of Israelis and Palestinians who are not “traditional peaceniks.” Members of the community should, at the least, hold greater empathy towards the other side in the conflict, and at best, work both as a group and individually from their positions in society towards greater peace and co-existence. Our hope is that participants will influence others in their communities and workplaces to see the conflict in different perspectives, and will work from influential positions in society towards a more peaceful future, possibly including from within the high-tech sector / through Arab-Jewish startups.

Our long-term outcomes can be broken into sub-outcomes: (1) engaging participants from diverse communities; (2) building a strong community that continues to interact following seminars; (3) fostering empathy among participants; (4) creating a hi-tech and business network of Jewish and Arab, Israeli and Palestinian young adults who assist each other in their careers, (5) creating the platform for future startups between Israeli and Palestinian entrepreneurs, and (6) prompting participants to work towards peace.

We will continue in the near-future to operate as a non-profit dependent on grants and donations. We have two major partners that are committed to our success.

We have considered the idea of charging students based on loans that are paid back when they are employed and financially solvent.

We have also considered investing in startups created by our alumni, acting as a VC fund and incubator in addition to trainer.

We prefer to not share the names of our funders publicly.

We are constantly fundraising to support our work. The demand for our work far outpaces our financial capabilities - as such, any increase in funding within reason will be put towards realistic expansion.

$250,000

We have truly seen unique success in our model, and have not seen similar models in other parts of the world. Yes, coding bootcamps exist. Yes, conflict dialogue programs exist. But we have not seen technology training and dialogue used in tandem towards parallel goals of peacebuilding and economic achievement.

We will invest funds in developing a professional staff, expanding around the world, and incubating Israeli-Palestinian joint startups that emerge from our program.

We have limited fundraising capability with a lack of professional staff. It would be fantastic to get mentorship and incubation for joint Israeli-Palestinian startups that emerge from our program. We could also use mentorship in expanding and developing a social venture business model, rather than remaining dependent on donations.