Reply #6: Shalom Achshav PeaceNow - Israel

[EFerrari]

About Shalom Achshav


Shalom Achshav (Peace Now) is the largest extra-parliamentary movement in Israel, the country's oldest peace movement and the only peace group to have a broad public base.

The movement was founded in 1978 during the Israeli-Egyptian peace talks. At a moment when these talks appeared to be collapsing, a group of 348 reserve officers and soldiers from the Israeli army's combat units published an open letter to the Prime Minister of Israel calling upon the government to make sure this opportunity for peace not be lost. Tens of thousands of Israelis sent in support for the letter, and the movement was born.

The basic principles of the movement from the outset were the right of Israel to live within secure borders and the right of our neighbors to the same, including the right of the Palestinians to self-determination. In time the movement became convinced that the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel in the territories occupied in the 1967 war is the only viable solution to the conflict. Once the PLO, in 1988, accepted UNSC resolution 242 and the principle of the two-state solution, Peace Now led a massive 100,000 person demonstration calling upon the government to negotiate with the PLO. Fully supporting the break-through represented by the 1993 Oslo Accords, Peace Now has consistently supported any and all steps promising to promote resolution of the conflict, in addition to pressing all parties in power in the country to initiate steps to bring about the end of the occupation and negotiations for peace.

Peace Now operates through public campaigns, advertisements, petitions, distribution of educational materials, conferences and lectures, surveys, dialogue groups, street activities, vigils, and demonstrations. The movement organized the largest demonstration ever held in Israel, some 400,000 people (of a population at the time of 5 ½ million) in 1982 calling for a commission of inquiry into the Sabra and Chatilla massacre. (The commission established as a result, recommended that Ariel Sharon be removed as Defense Minister.)

http://www.peacenow.org/shalom/about.asp