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Message: <br /><br /> If you are having trouble reading this email, you may view this article online at: http://www.jweekly.com/35065/full/35065/arab-children-log-on-at-israel-computer-lab/ <br /><br /> <b>Arab children log on at Israel computer lab</b> <br /> Friday, May 30, 2008 | by dan pine <br /><br /><p>Shereen Mohammed's 5-year-old son, Ahmed, looked up from the flat-screen monitor and said to his mother, "Mommy, did you have a computer center when you were growing up?"<br /><br /> She laughs when telling the story. Of course she had no computer center. Such luxuries have rarely been within reach for Arab Israelis, 50 percent of whom live in poverty.<br /><br /> But now, in the Arab town of Umm el-Fahm, south of Israel's Jezreel Valley, a new computer center is up and running, and kids like Ahmed can barely let go of the mouse.<br /><br /> The early childhood computer center is a project of ECHAD — a partnership among the Israeli government, the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee and the S.F.-based Jewish Community Federation.<br /><br /> Open less than a year, the center serves thousands of Arab kindergartners from 123 area schools. For virtually all of them, this is their first encounter with a computer.<br /><br /> With a population of 44,000, Umm el-Fahm is Israel's second-largest Arab city. It's a poor town, located on a series of hills dotted with rocks and thirsty-looking evergreens. At least 2,000 children receive social service assistance, and most of them come from single-parent homes, largely because their fathers live in the West Bank, unable to travel into Israel.<br /><br /> But once at the center, these Arab Israeli children enter a world of 64-bit possibilities.<br /><br /> Dr. Mahmod Zohdi is one of the center's organizers. He says getting kids to play computer games -- "edutainment," as he calls it -- has far-reaching consequences, even beyond meeting the educational needs of children ages 2 to 7.<br /><br /> "Parents and kids take computer lessons together," says Zohdi. "Children are not the center of [Arab] family life. There was silence in the home but now they talk."<br /><br /> Because of demand and space limitations, children visit the center only twice a month for daylong sessions. But once there, they take on visually stimulating and intellectually challenging computer games.<br /><br /> Compared to "Guitar Hero" or "Grand Theft Auto," the games are simplistic, but for these children, such programs provide a good first step toward computer literacy. They cover topics such as music, art, reading and social skills. And the classes don't just exercise their minds — they also give the children opportunities to play together, as well as interact with their parents.<br /><br /> Gila Noam, the S.F. federation's Israel-based coordinator, says programs such as this not only help Israel's Arab minority. They also help the Jewish state overall. <br /><br /> "We are trying to strengthen Israel as a democratic, pluralistic, tolerant society," she said, as she joined a tour of the center for Bay Area visitors on the S.F. federation's Israel@60 mission. "This is the other reality of Israel we need to come to terms with."<br /><br /> Through ECHAD, the federation also helps support well-baby clinics, a nurse's initiative program and other efforts to bolster the Arab Israeli community.<br /><br /> With 14 percent unemployment and a skyrocketing birth rate, the Arab Israeli community faces increasing social problems in the years ahead. Noam says that is why Arabs and Jews work together in Umm el-Fahm to stave off the worst.<br /><br /> It even has the added benefit of reducing tensions between Arabs and Jews.<br /><br /> "When the Jewish community comes from abroad to help this community," Zohdi says, "this is a good story to tell my son."</p>

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