The Roosevelt Institution
Meeting Time: 7 on Mondays, TD Common Room
Gidon Bromberg is a World Fellow in the fall of 2007 coming from Israel who is Director of Friends of the Earth Middle East. FoEME is known for its innovative methods of encouraging regional cooperation with environmentally friendly goals. For example, he fosters agreements between Israeli and Palestinian communities to help them gain access to clean water, simultaneously promoting peace among the communities. The Center for Security and Foreign Policy is interested in exploring other opportunities to promote sustainability and environmental friendliness in the Middle East while also working towards improving relationships among communities in the Middle East. Hopefully, this would be done with advising from FoEME and after the policy plan is written, could become a long term project for the Center to oversee its implementation.
The problem we hope to address is two-fold. At its heart, the project hopes to begin solving security issues in the Middle East at the micro level by forming ties among communities with interests that they both share. So, while this is a project that addresses security and foreign policy issues, it attacks them on the environmental level. Starting with facilitating the conditions in the region where environmentalists work together to attain sustainable development, our goal is to help lay some of the groundwork necessary for cooperation throughout the region. Unrest in the Middle East has been a persisting problem for over half a century, specifically among Israel and the surrounding predominately-Muslim countries. Environmental consciousness is growing globally, and while resource depletion has been an issue for quite a while, it has been worsening over recent years. Increasing interest in the environment makes for a perfect opportunity to tackle both sustainability and peace in the Middle East on a small scale.
Group members:
Matthew Ellison
Amira Valliani
Nafez Aldakkak
Julia Atkinson
Ronik S Bhangoo
Kelly M Cannon
Frank Cirillo
Bjorn A Cooley
Edward Fishman
William C Gangware
Fatima Ghani
Michelle Glienke
David A Gottesman
Micah Hendler
Matthew S Levinson
Travis A Marchman
Adam Rodriques
Bradley A Schecter
Yaron Schwartz
Jason Silberstein