The Israel Palestine Project

"a common history, an extraordinary future"

Jack Berriault

Jack Berriault, founder and guiding force of TIPP, is a powerful and successful change agent, activist and entrepreneur in the Bay Area.  He has dedicated his life to human rights and social transformation since, in 1945 at the age of 14, he was profoundly impacted by the newsreels of the liberation of Auschwitz and other concentration camps.  In 2001, he also became concerned about the injustices suffered by the Palestinian civilian population in the occupation.

Jack joined a group called The Global Exchange, and toured the West Bank, Gaza, Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.  He interviewed leaders of human rights and peace organizations and came to the extraordinary realization that the Israelis and the Palestinians were living at the effect of two different, opposite and contradictory stories of what had happened.  Both narratives were riddled with myths and inaccuracies, and he saw that clearing up the misperceptions and creating a common story that both sides could agree upon would create a foundation for peace in the Middle East.

Jack founded The Israel Palestine Project to take on as its first initiative to craft a common historical narrative.  This story invites both perspectives and clarifies and dismantles the inaccuracies of perception of historical events that keep the conflict intractable.

Social transformation and empowerment are at the heart of Jack Berriault’s mission in the Middle East.  Through his decades of work in the social transformation arena, including 3-1/2 years as National Director of The Hunger Project in Central America, he learned first hand that “When you change the story that people tell themselves and others, you transform people’s lives.” 

Jack and The Israel Palestine Project have the support of some prestigious and powerful global leaders. Supporters include Ilan Pappe, senior lecturer at Haifa University; Rabbi Michael Lerner, TIKKUN; Cornell West of Princeton University; Marshall Rosenberg, founder of Non-Violent Communication; Mubarak Awad, founder of Non-Violence International; Marcelle Kardush, Palestinian retired professor of psychology at San Francisco University; Elias Botto, Palestinian Arab, member of a dialogue group of Palestinian Arabs and Jews; as well as Andrew Samuels, Professor of analytical psychology at Essex University London.

Jack Berriault believes that peace in the Middle East is not only possible but also critical for peace around the world. The goal of TIPP is an equitable and enduring peace in the Middle East by 2015, through the creation of a common historical narrative that is accepted by both sides.  Jack and members of TIPP imagine the day when peace has come to the Middle East and people will ask, “How could we have let this happen? Why did we allow it to go on so long?”