Creating Effective Nonviolent Actions: Building Interfaith Alliances Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb and Noura Khouri Sunday, September 13, 2009 2:30 p.m. Oak Park Public Library, Veterans Room 834 Lake Street, Oak Park The number of Americans who have been to Palestine to witness and experience the Israeli occupation has exploded over the last decade. The local and national networks formed by these activists are being strengthened and sharpened by growing numbers and political sophistication. How is the activity of these individuals and organizations affecting the American political landscape? What is the special role of multifaith networks in peace advocacy? What is the significance of the growing movement for boycott, sanctions, and divestment from institutions that empower and profit from occupation? How are the media reporting and responding to changing attitudes toward the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?   Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb and Noura Khouri are working at the forefront of the pro-peace, pro-justice movement in the U.S. Khouri and Gottlieb, colleagues at the American Friends Service Committee office in San Francisco, have teamed together as an American Jew and a Palestinian-American to educate and advocate for peace and justice in the Middle East. Recently they organized Citizen Hearings on the misuse of U.S. weapons during Israel’s recent military attack on Gaza in 2009. Their interfaith work in the Bay area has included organizing Congressional advocacy visits, media campaigns, vigils, fasts, speaking tours, divestment efforts, and delegations to the Middle East.   Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb is cofounder of The Community of Living Traditions, a residential multifaith community at Stony Point Center, Stony Point, NY. The Community of Living Traditions is dedicated to the study and practice of nonviolence and peace advocacy. As director of Shomer Shalom Network for the Torah of Nonviolence, she is currently organizing Interfaith Peacewalk Gaza Satyagraha that will be part of the Dec. 27th Gaza Freedom March. She is contributing editor of Fellowship Magazine and has led two recent Fellowship of Reconciliation delegations to Iran. She is currently co-director of Middle East Peace Programming with the American Friends Service Committee, San Francisco. Lynn is rabbi to the Danforth Jewish Circle in Canada, a wilderness guide, percussionist, storyteller and Klezmer dancer.   Noura Khouri co-directs the Middle East Program at the American Friends Service Committee in San Francisco. She received her B.A. in International Relations at San Francisco State University and lived and worked in Occupied Palestinian Territories from 2005-2007. Her background is in creating and planning advocacy campaigns for human rights organizations, while doing community outreach and promotions for non-profit organizations and political campaigns. Prior to her work with AFSC she was with Peace Action West in Las Vegas NV, as a Campaign Organizer - lobbying Presidential candidates for the 2008 elections -  pursuing a complete and immediate withdrawal of U.S. forces out of Iraq, and for nuclear non-proliferation, beginning in the U.S.