John McHugo, the Balfour project trustee who supervises the fellowship programme, writes:
“This is the fifth year of our fellowship programme, which continues to go from strength to strength. This year the fellows will be working on seven projects. All are relevant to the aims and objectives of the Balfour Project and include some exciting new ones.
One project will produce workshops for GCSE and A Level students looking at the social media war between Israel and Palestine. They will focus on developing media literacy, source analysis skills and linguistic examination. A second project is the launch of a TikTok channel which will promote awareness of and engagement with the mission of the Balfour project, especially among a younger demographic. A third will produce a series of podcasts in which fellows look at what motivated them to become interested in Israel and Palestine.
The fourth project will produce a practical handbook to help people improve standards of public debate on the issue of antisemitism, with the objective of feeding back into existing anti-racism work inextricably tied to Israel and Palestine. The fifth will explore the strong identification with Palestine or Israel among communities in Northern Ireland, which is an issue about which there is all too little awareness.
Finally, we will also continue two of last year’s projects. The first is the advocacy project to encourage the UK and other countries to recognise Palestine as a sovereign state, while the other is a development of the Save Masafer Yatta campaign, which has been extended to cover the urgent issue of settler violence in the whole of Area C.”
2023/24 projects
Antisemitism Handbook by Toby Kunin, Elah Cohen, and Sylvie Maxwell Macdonald
“A Social Media War: Palestine and Israel” A-Level and GCSE workshops by Taya Amit, Lara Arekat, Haneen Khano and Emma Todres
‘My Past, our Future’ podcast by Valentin Herdeg, Jasmine Moore, and Haneen Khano
Tik Tok/Social media project by Lily Wood, Becky Beard, Elah Cohen and Kira Nygren
An exploration of support for Israel and Palestine in Northern Ireland by Dr Rachael Stockdale
Settler Violence in Area C by Kira Nygren and Jasmine Moore
Continuation of Recognise Palestine by Matthew Cockrell and Alex Fairhead
2022/23 projects
Israel and International law: Influencing the UK-Israel Free Trade Agreement by Andrea Wong, Dina Gitlin-Leigh and Laura Bramall
Occupied Environments by Lucy Mooring, Madeline Elmitt and Matthew Holt
Humanising Palestinians in Anglo-Jewish Contexts by Joe Haidar, Joel Stokes, Nicole Munson and Adnan Mahmud
Mandate Social History workshops for A-Level students by Ethan Hadad and Ross Plowman
Recognising Palestine by Joseph Hearn and Daniel Mautner
Continuation of Save Masafer Yatta campaign by Ross Plowman and Dina Gitlin-Leigh
UK’s Contribution to the Surveillance Industry of Israel: A Palestinian Prospective by Adnan Mahmud
2021/22 projects
Legacies and Possibilities: Perspectives on Palestinian Heritage by Archie Williams, Amber Khan and Cecilia Cáceres Juan
Life in Late Ottoman and Mandatory Palestine: a Social History Workshop for Secondary Schools by Eibhlin Priestley and Jean Franco
Live Literature: Palestine and Israel by Emily Abdeni-Holman and Salma Altabari
Opportunities For Encounter- Christian Tours and Pilgrimages to The Holy Land (Israel and Palestine) by Anne-Marie Clements and Rebecca Argall
The Threat of Expulsion in Masafer Yatta by Douglas Gerrard, Pyla Bird-Leakey and Maya Novi
2020/21 projects
Bedouins in Area C by Adam Abdalla, Jordan Jones, Stav Salpeter
IHRA Report Project by Gilang Al Ghifari Lukman, Jack Walton, Martha Scott-Cracknell, Omar Sharif, Sarah Chaya Smith
Israel-Palestine in Schools in the UK by Aimée-Stephanie Reid, Haneen Zeglam, Sam Lytton Cobbold
Mapping: An art exhibition exploring homeland, identity and British colonialism in Israel-Palestine by Rosie Richards and Francesca Vawdrey