CHRONICLES OF THE INTERNATIONAL NEWS AGENCY
The Best of People
SEEDS
OF PEACE
By Paulette Attie
Photo: Janet Wallach, soul, mind and heart of "SEEDS OF PEACE".
Ms. Wallach is currently executive vice president of Seeds of Peace, a conflict resolution program which brings together teenagers from the Middle East; India, Pakistan and Afghanistan; the Balkans; and Greece, Turkey and divided Cyprus. The organization has a year-round program that includes a summer camp in Maine, a Center for Coexistence in Jerusalem, annual conferences and an educational arm that helps Seeds alumni attend college in the U.S. Over 3,000 participants have participated in a three-week session at the camp in Maine and then returned to their regions for further workshops, meetings and conflict resolution programs.
Ms. Wallach is a Woodrow Wilson Institute Visiting Fellow and has taught at Earlham College; Longwood College; Ohio Wesleyan University; Stetson College; St. Olaph’s College; Bradford College; Susquehana College; and West Virginia Wesleyan College. As a frequent contributor to The Washington Post Magazine from 1982-1987, and as a contributor to Smithsonian Magazine and other periodicals, Janet Wallach has written cover story profiles of Iraqi Ambassador Nizar Hamdoon; Her Majesty Queen Noor of Jordan; Reza Pahlavi, heir to the throne of Iran; PLO envoy Hassan Abdul Rahman; Saudi entrepreneur Adnan Khashoggi; First Lady of Egypt Jihan Sadat; and the British official Gertrude Bell. Janet Wallach was born in New York City and received a B.A. degree from New York University. She was married to the late John Wallach, founder and president of Seeds of Peace, and has two sons, David Allyn, and Michael Wallach.
SEEDS OF PEACE
Photo:
John Wallach.
SEEDS OF PEACE began with a toast made over a glass of champagne. John and Janet Wallach were attending a small reception in Washington D.C. honoring Israel’s then Foreign Minister, Shimon Peres. The Wallachs had co-authored 3 books about the Middle East, and were highly respected in Washington circles. It was at that dinner that John Wallach spontaneously proposed that he would start a camp in the United States where teenagers from conflicting areas could work and play together. Most importantly, they could get to know each other as human beings and not “the enemy.” Also present at the party were the Egyptian Ambassador and the PLO Envoy. Wallach asked them, along with Peres, to go back to their governments and ask for teenagers from their communities to attend the camp. His reasoning was that the only way to effect a change is by working with young people who were not yet entrenched in hatred: “If you can change their thinking, you can change their behavior.” A camp setting would give them the opportunity to form friendships and develop trust and respect for one another. The brilliant thought behind that was when these teenagers became adults, they would become leaders and effect a positive change in the world. It’s one thing to propose a toast under the heady influence of sparkling champagne. It’s quite another to fulfill the promise. Wallach first had to overcome a number of obstacles. There was getting the governments to approve of sending representatives. He then had to raise the money to run the program and find a qualified staff. Importantly, he needed a summer camp that would donate their facilities to try this experiment. He found it at Camp Powhatan in Otisfield, Maine, where his son had been a camper.
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