Yom Ha'atzmaut, Israeli Independence Day, holds very different meanings for Israelis and Palestinians.

For Jews it is a day of national liberation, a culmination of 2,000 years of longing, a hopeful answer to the despair of the Holocaust.

For Palestinians it is the "Nakba," or catastrophe, a day on which many mark their own exile from ancestral lands and relive the humiliation of the Arab armies' defeat at the hands of the Jews.

Reconciling these two versions of history, let alone teaching both in a high school classroom, may seem like an impossible task.

But two academics, one Israeli and one Palestinian, have taken on this challenge and in doing so have created an award-winning approach to peace-building both in and outside the classroom.

As codirectors of the Peace Research Institute in the Middle East, Israeli psychologist Dan Bar-On and Palestinian educator Sami Adwan have developed a curriculum that exposes students in each community to the other's version of the same set of events.

Their current assignment has brought them to Monmouth University in West Long Branch, where they will serve as Fulbright Scholars-in-Residence for the 2007 spring semester.

The men will lend their knowledge and expertise to the university's global education curriculum.

They have also brought an innovative resource to the campus: "Learning Each Other's Historical Narrative: Palestinians and Israelis," a 40-page booklet coauthored by Bar-On and Adwan. It details the efforts of a group of Israeli and Palestinian high school history teachers to develop balanced narratives of three historical events: the 1917 Balfour Declaration, affirming Britain's support for the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine; the 1948 war for Israeli independence; and the 1987 Palestinian Intifada.

The booklet was composed in 2002 and has been published in Hebrew, Arabic, and English. Instead of revising existing texts, the publication presents a "dual-narrative" approach to teaching the history of the Middle East, the educators told NJ Jewish News.

"We believe that teachers can be trained to be emissaries for peace-building, to teach the narrative of both sides, and to encourage students to question what they learn regarding both narratives," Bar-On explained. "The kind of dual history that is presented in our publication encourages respect for each narrative and supports a culture of peace."

The publication is also designed to encourage each side to listen to and learn about the other while recognizing and acknowledging those instances of peace and cooperation that have existed between Palestinians and Jews, added Adwan.

"Denial and a lack of knowledge will never help improve the situation in the Middle East," he said. "But education can lead to understanding, and understanding the differences in perspectives can lead to peace."

And peace also can be achieved by recognizing societal differences, Bar-On said.

"We think true peace means that you recognize how others are different from you, not how others are the same as you are," said Bar-On. "You have to recognize that others think differently, and education is a means to that end."

Although the history teachers who helped develop the project have been teaching the dual narratives to Israeli and Palestinian students in their ninth- and 10th-grade classes, the project is still considered to be an experiment in education, according to Adwan.

"We know this approach is not without problems or difficulties," he said. "We will be able to follow up and draw conclusions about the success of the project by noting the reactions of students and teachers." Each copy of the booklet allocates space for students and educators to write their own comments.

The two scholars hope that Monmouth University's students and faculty members will join the challenge.

"This is a way we can all adopt a formula to create peace today, rather than tomorrow," said Bar-On. "There is so much potential for a better future. We hope that teachers and students will share our vision."

Their efforts to promote peace in the Middle East have earned Adwan and Bar-On numerous awards, including the Alexander Langer Foundation Peace Prize in 2001 and, in 2005, the European Association for the Education of Adults Prize and the inaugural Victor Goldberg Institute of International Education Prize for Peace.

The presence of Bar-On and Adwan at Monmouth University will enhance the school's efforts to promote peace through education, research, and project cooperation, said MU president Paul G. Gaffney II.

"This is a unique opportunity to bring together peace builders from a chronically troubled region," said Gaffney. "Our students and faculty members will be able to participate in a series of rich dialogues and learning experiences among Israeli, Palestinian, and American scholars."

The Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence program brings visiting scholars and professionals from other countries to lecture at American colleges and universities for a semester or an academic year. The program is funded by the United States Department of State and the Council for International Exchange of Scholars.

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