History
Moshav Shorashim was founded by a group of young immigrants from North America in 1981.Originally organized as a communal moshav, Shorashim set up several collective enterprises, including a seminar center that opened in 1987.This center, ''Makom ba-Galil'' (''A place in the Galilee'') offered educational programs on aspects of history and modern life in the Galilee, to tourists and to Israeli visitors. The community's members included some talented informal educators, and within a few years the center had developed an outstanding reputation, especially for Jewish-Arab encounters, and for creative Jewish identity programs at historical sites in the area. The center has received funding from a variety of sources to support the development of new programming and training of professional manpower, and has continued to expand its repertoire and its reach. In recent years, Makom ba-Galil has operated programs for several Partnership 2000 regions in the north. Today, the center is a non-profit foundation, the Galilee Foundation for ValueEducation - Shorashim.
Educational Vision
- We believe in a vision of Zionism as an effort to create a Jewish state that is a ''light unto the nations,'' a society that ''knows the heart of the stranger,'' and therefore enables persons and groups representing a wide range of ethnic and national identities and religious and ideological commitments to live together in harmony.
- We believe that educational activities are not only a reflection and perpetuation of existing social realities, but can be a formative influence, playing a role in changing individuals and thereby in''changing the social order.
- We believe that self-knowledge and self-awareness - in individuals and in groups - are crucial for generating the security in one's own identity that is the basis for openness to and respect for the identities of others.
- We believe that there cannot be harmony without knowledge of the ''other,''not only knowledge on the factual level of history and culture, but also on the human level of familiarity with his/her hopes and fears,aspirations and disappointments. This implies the need both for study and for direct personal encounter.
- We believe that it is important to learn to live with complexity: reality is rich and often confusing. Intergroup understanding is furthered when we face that richness with humility - and not when we seek to simplify it into slogans.
- We believe that the Galilee as a region, with its unique combination of human and natural resources, can serve as a laboratory and demonstration site for realizing a vision of a society based on intergroup harmony and cooperation.
Goals
- Fostering of mutual understanding and cooperation between different ideological and religious streams in Judaism
- Fostering of mutual understanding and cooperation between Jews and Arabs in the Galilee
- Deepening and strengthening the links between Israel and the Diaspora
- Education for the application of humane, Jewish values in Israeli society
- Deepening the connection to the Jewish heritage in the Galilee
Location
The Galilee Foundation for Value Education - Shorashim is located at Shorashim, a community settlement which is part of the Misgav Region Local Council- ten minutes from Karmiel and forty-five minutes from Safed, Tiberias and Haifa. Surrounded by mountains and overlooking the sea, Shorashim is also a brief drive from both Palestinian-Arab and Jewish settlements and close to important historical sites of the region such as Zippori and Acco.
Target Population
Our programs are aimed at all age groups, from elementary school though adult. We work with professionals, non-professionals and volunteers,educators and counselors; Arabs and Jews; Reform, Conservative, Reconstructionist, and Orthodox Jews; Diaspora Jews and Israelis.
