SFCG Awards for Middle East Journalism

By Suheir Rasul

Suheir Rasul is Co-Director of SFCG Jersusalem

Search for Common Ground’s Jerusalem office recently hosted the Eliav-Sartawi Awards for Middle Eastern Journalism. The Awards, which began in 2000, recognize journalists whose work promotes greater understanding between Arabs and Israelis.

Aziz Abu Sarah (l) and Yizhar Be’er (r)

The annual ceremony is hosted in Jerusalem and winners each receive an engraved plaque along with a $1000 prize. The 2009 Awards were held on Nov. 16 at the city’s Ambassador Hotel.  Awardees included: Palestinian Aziz Abu Sarah, Israeli Yizhar Be’er and Mona Eltahawy, an Egyptian journalist.  (Links to their winning articles are listed below).

Approximately 60 guests were in attendance, each from a variety of government and nonprofit agencies. Some notable guests were U.S.consul general Daniel Rubenstein along with representatives from USAID and the U.S. Middle East Partnership Initiative.

During the program, award winners were each invited to give a speech.  Abu Sarah explained that despite his brother being killed as a result of the Arab-Israeli conflict, he did not become resentful, but rather made a commitment to helping construct a better, more peaceful future

Yizhar Be'er gives acceptance speech

for both states.

Yizhar Be’er admitted that he has always been a pessimist about conflict in the Middle East,  but writing the Common Ground News article was a transformative moment. He was commissioned to write the piece last December, immediately after the outbreak of the Gaza War and unlike most of his previously published articles, it was the first that compelled him to write something constructive. Be’er explained that, thereafter, he began to think and write differently. His testimony is exemplary of how media can be used to bring about positive change.

Because Eltahawy was unable to attend, she sent a video which can be viewed below.

The Awards are named after two pioneers of Israeli-Palestinian dialogue: Dr. Issam Sartawi, an advisor to Yasser Arafat and who was assassinated in 1983 for his peacebuilding efforts as well as Lova Eliav, an Israeli politician who was active since the state’s founding. Both received the 1979 Kreisky Prize of Austria for their commitment to exploring peaceful solutions to the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Read the winning articles

Aziz Abu Sarah: “A Palestinian remembers the Holocaust”

Yizhar Be’er: “Human tragedy as a catalyst for change”

Mona Eltahawy: “The Loneliest Man in the World”