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The TurnTheTide HOME PAGE STORY:
For a few years at the end of the 20th century and for the first 4 years of the 21st century the function of TurnTheTide was to report on amazing Citizen Peace Movements in the Holy Land. Time after time Israelis and Palestinians contradicted the LIE used by politicians on both sides to justify the ongoing violence. The LIE was that "there was no one on the other side to talk to."
In reporting the day-to-day bloody tragedy and heroic refusal of ordinary women and men to accept the tragedy as inevitable and impossible to stop, five different stories seemed to evolve. Four of the stories listed below are told on this web site. The fifth story has taken on a life of its own.
The fifth story is a different kind of Citizens Peace Proposal. The proposal is for a "7 Generations Remembering & Reconnecting Project" in which youth and elders work together to cure the virus of violence infecting the entire world.
The fifth story has evolved as a "seed" to be planted in cyberspace. An official "planting" will occur with the launch of a cyberspace "node" in the Spring of 2009. In the meantime the "seed document" is being cultivated on an Internet launch platform. The launch platform will include related Archive resource documents and an Appendix.
To learn more about the seed planting of "7 Generations Remembering and Reconnecting Project" go to www.Earth-Learning.org. To receive a six page INTRODUCTION to the 7grrp you can contact: Mario@earth-learning.org.
FIVE STORIES: Five Breakthroughs in understanding a "new type of thinking" Albert Einstein said we must master to avoid "unparalleled catastrophe" in the 21st Century.
#3: "Nine/Eleven as a Bifurcation." Dr. Raima Larter, Professor and Chair of the Chemistry Department at Indiana University-Perdue University, describes a path that ended when terrorists attacked the Twin Towers in New York City. We are choosing a new path for civilization.
#4: "Changed Hearts: Loves Response to Violence." Father Elias Chacour describes a path at least 10,000 years old that is ending for Christians, Jews, and Muslims. The choice is between the authentic spirit of a loving God and a vengeful, tribal God who condones "sacred violence."
TurnTheTide Contents:
Each story is linked to additional pages in TurnTheTide's archives for more information and documentation. The archives are housed in four cyberspace Sections each with a variety of Reading Rooms. A link to the Site Map is located at the top of the left column of every page to make browsing the web site easy. All pages can be Selected>Copied&>Pasted to make them available to read on your computer or to print out.
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SITE MAP:
Web site Archive Sections and main Reading Rooms:
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Scan down to read the following:
 The Inspiration for TurnTheTide.
 TurnTheTide Dedication to "The Parents Circle - Family Forum"
 America's unique opportunity to turn the tide of terrorism
 Awakening Grandparents identified
 Fair Use Statement
The Inspiration for TurnTheTide
TurnTheTide was inspired by Israeli and Palestinian citizen diplomats who reached out to each other to form an alliance for peace. They refused to be enemies. Together, they created "islands of peace" in the midst of an unimaginable sea of terror. Their story is one of amazing bravery, patriotism, love, and reconciliation.
World citizens from other nations traveled to the Holy Land to join the alliance. They volunteered to serve as "human shields." They stood between "enemies" who had been taught from childhood to fear, hate, and fight each other. Rachel Corrie was one of these.
TurnTheTide offers a peace proposal inspired by women and men who may be the only real "peace experts" in the world today. For years they have negotiated peace while professional diplomats and politicians have failed.
Citizen diplomats in Israel and Palestine, along with international observers, reported to the world, simply and truthfully, what they observed. Their reports are recorded in thousands of e-mail messages. Their descriptions of the "storm of terror" up-close tell a story different from the one usually portrayed in the news media. These eyewitness "Links" provide much of the content for this web site.
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DEDICATION
TurnTheTide web site is dedicated to The Parents Circle - Family Forum
The Parents Circle - Family Forum includes some 400 Israeli and Palestinian parents whose children have been killed by terrorists. www.theparentscircle.com
The following quote is from Nurit Peled-Elhanan, whose 14-year-old daughter was murdered by a suicide bomber. Nurit and Izzat Ghazzawi, a Palestinian mother whose son Ramy, 16, was killed by Israeli troops, were awarded the European Parliament's freedom of speech award, The Sakharov Prize.
"We have been made to pay the highest price for a war that should have ended long ago...by letting careless, ruthless and cynical politicians use the lives of our children as chips in their deadly games..."
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America's unique opportunity to turn the tide of terrorism
AN IDEA WHOSE TIME HAS COME: PEACE AID OR WAR AID?
If America exercised its moral power it could turn the tide of terrorism in the Holy Land with one decision. One change of policy is needed. The President or Congress could make the decision. No additional expenditures of U.S. taxpayers' money would be required. People everywhere in the world would celebrate. Israelis, Palestinians, Americans, and Jews in all nations would feel more secure. America would again provide moral leadership to the world. Its dependence on its military power for security would be lessened. More attention could be given to stabilizing the U.S. economy. See " Voices of Peacemakers" then " Peace Proposal."
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Grandparents Awakening: who are we?
We are retired seniors who support the Citizen Diplomats Peace Proposal. We are awakening to a crisis our generation helped to create. A crisis being passed on to our grandchildren. A crisis we seek to alleviate in a new retirement career as "peacemakers."
Concepts for TurnTheTide web site grew out of meetings of the Haywood Peace Fellowship at Lake Junaluska, North Carolina.
After retirement, one member, Doug Wingeier, joined a Christian Peacemaker Team assigned to Israel and Palestine. Doug linked us, via Internet, to a flood of eyewitness reports describing a very different war from the one we watched on TV and read about in newspapers. Our Awakening Project came into being when we couldn't reconcile the differences between the "eyewitness war" and the "media war."
We believe peace in the Middle East is more possible than Americans are led to believe. Peace has been happening in incremental bits and pieces. It has happened because some Israeli citizens and Palestinian citizens want peace so much they refuse to believe leaders who say peace is impossible because the "other side" doesn't want it.
We believe lessons learned by Israeli and Palestinian peacemakers could be of immense help in planning strategies for winning the worldwide "war on terrorism."
Five Grandparents are contributing to TurnTheTide' Awakening Project:
Bill Holden, retired aeronautical engineer and industrial psychologist, now editor, "Cooperatives and Community" Action Linkage Network idea-exchange newsletter.
Bill Price, retired Executive Director of the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, cofounder and President of World Peacemakers, now editor World Peacemakers newsletter.
Mark Rouch, retired United Methodist minister, a Gandhi scholar, former director, Intentional Growth Center, Lake Junaluska, NC, now editor Haywood Peace Fellowship newsletter.
Doug Wingeier, retired Emeritus Professor of Pracgtical Theology and summer dean at Garrett Evangelical Theological Seminary, author, and volunteer, Christian Peacemaker Team, Hebron, Palestine.
McGregor Smith, Jr., retired professor and founder, Environmental Ethics Institute, Miami-Dade Community College, now Grandparents Awakening coordinator for TurnTheTide.info.
Grandparents Awakening are especially indebted to:
>Sister Miriam Therese MacGillis, Founding Director, Genesis Farm, for critiquing the print copy of the web site and Study Guide, and for resources related to "deep time" and the "fate of Earth."
>Father Thomas Berry for three seminal books that provide a "new type of thinking" about the choice humans are making in the 21st century. The books are: "The Dream of the Earth," "The Universe Story," and "The Great Work."
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Fair Use Statement:
This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
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