Playing a Leadership Role

For over 20 years, Holy Land Trust has been a critical player in the local and global nonviolent movement to achieve peace and justice. We continually work across regional divisions, political lines, and international borders to unite the voices demanding justice and equality for all. We've worked on the ground organizing noncompliance campaigns, direct nonviolent actions, and global advocacy initiatives. We've been pioneering in our approach in setting up programs of personal sustainability and empowerment for activists in the movement. We've also been taken the lead and carving out a principled path to nonviolent activism in the Holy Land. Reframing the conversation away from the broken paradigm of "Israelis-vs-Palestinians," we've adopted a holistic approach by looking at systems of oppression, and linking gender, race, class, and other forms of structural violence to usher in new methods of equality.

Real Change

Throughout the years, we've been able to leverage our paradigm of peacemaking and our broad, diverse network to create real changes on the ground. For many, locally and globally, we are seen as the reference and carrier of understanding the philosophical, practical, strategic, and spiritual dynamics of nonviolence.

When the Second Intifada started in the year 2000, Holy Land Trust played a leading role in nonviolent activism and direct action. We trained hundreds of activists, organized mass demonstrations in areas where Palestinian land was being threatened or confiscated, and built creative strategies and operations.

Sumud Freedom Camp

Most recently, Holy Land Trust was one of the leading Palestinian organizations leading the charge in the Sumud Freedom Camp Coalition. The coalition ushered in one of the most significant direct nonviolent actions in the community of Sarura, a small Palestinian hamlet in the South Hebron Hills. The goal of the action was to create "facts on the ground' and restore a Palestinian presence to a community that had been vacant for decades. Over a year later, there is an ongoing presence on that land, fit with infrastructure and community outreach.