Peace Building Through Women’s Health

Book excerpt: This book is an examination of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through psychoanalytic, sociopsychological, and nationalistic lenses, highlighting the successes and the hurdles faced by one organization, Healing Across the Divides (HATD), in its mission to measurably improve health in marginalized populations of both Israelis and Palestinians. Peace Building through Women’s Health begins with a summary of the "peace building through health" field and a psychoanalytic, sociopsychological examination of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. After a series of informative case studies, the book concludes with an analysis of how this organization has evolved its "peace building through health" approach over the fifteen years since its founding. Working with community groups, HATD has measurably improved the lives of more than 200,000 marginalized Israelis and Palestinians. In the process, it also improves the effectiveness of the community group grantees, by offering experienced management consulting and by requiring rigorous ongoing self-assessment on the part of the groups. IHATD hopes that, in the long term, some of the community leaders it supports will be tomorrow’s political leaders. As these leaders strengthen their own capabilities, they will be able to increasingly contribute to securing peace in one of the longest running conflicts in the world today. Peace Building through Women’s Health will be invaluable to public and mental health professionals interested in international health, peace and conflict studies, and conflict resolution.