Vivian Silver Impact Award

Vivian Silver Impact Award
Vivian Silver
Awarded forThe award is granted to an Arab woman and an Israeli woman who embody the values and actions of the late Canadian-Israeli Vivian Silver.
Sponsored byNew Israel Fund
First awarded2024
WinnersFirst year winners:

The Vivian Silver Impact Award is presented annually to an Arab woman and Israeli woman who embody the values and actions of the Canadian-Israeli peace activist Vivian Silver (1949-2023). The award was created by the family of Vivian Silver and launched and coordinated with the assistance of the New Israel Fund.[1] The award is 55,000 NIS (New Israeli Shekel), which is equivalent to about 15,000 U.S. dollars, which will be given each year.[2][3]

Criteria for the award

The award is granted to an Arab woman and an Israeli woman who embody the values and actions of Vivian Silver in terms of the following:[2]

  • Building Arab-Jewish partnership in Israel.
  • Establishing peace between Israel and Palestine.
  • Advancing women to decision-making.
  • Advancing women in leadership positions.

Vivian Silver

Vivian Silver was a Canadian-Israeli peace activist who was killed by Hamas terrorist during October 7 Hama led attack on Israel when she was at Kibbutz Be’eri, a kibbutz in southern Israel. In collaboration with Palestinian peace activist and community organizer Amal Elsana Alh’ joojj, Vivian and Amal established AJEEC—the Arab-Jewish Center for Equality, Empowerment, and Cooperation in 2000. The partnership empowered Bedouin women in the Israeli region to access good paying jobs acceptable to their traditional communities.[1]

The Arab-Jewish Center for Equality, Empowerment, and Cooperation (AJEEC) describes the efforts of Silver as:[4][1]

For more than five decades, Vivian Silver dedicated her efforts and passion to bringing people together in dignity, cooperation, and mutual respect.  With a keen eye and an open heart, she fostered equality – between women and men, between Arabs and Jews – in Israeli society, and actively strived for peace in the region.

First Recipients of the award

In 2024, the first recipients of the award, from out of more than one hundred candidates, were Dr. Rula Hardal and May Pundak, the co-directors of the A Land for All, an Israeli-Palestinian peace movement, for their dedication to the promotion of two sovereign states, Israel and Palestine, that will work in "together to ensure democracy and security for both peoples".[5]

References

  1. ^ a b c "Vivian Silver". Jewish Women's Archive. Retrieved 2024-12-25.
  2. ^ a b "The Vivian Silver Award, to be awarded annually to two women, Jewish and Palestinian, who work in an inspiring way or have demonstrated significant achievements in one of the areas that embodies the work of the late Vivian". Alliance for Middle East Peace. 2024-12-24. Retrieved 2024-12-25.
  3. ^ "Israeli Currency". www.jerusalem-insiders-guide.com. Retrieved 2024-12-25.
  4. ^ "Vivian Silver Impact Award". Vivian Silver Award. Retrieved 2024-12-25.
  5. ^ Directors of Israeli-Palestinian Coexistence Organization Recipients of Award Honoring Life-long Peace Activist Killed in Oct. 7 Attack - Israel News - Haaretz.com