Academic Medicine as a Bridge to Peace: Building Arab and Israeli Cooperation

Can you imagine Canadian, Israeli, Jordanian, and Palestinian medical students singing, volunteering, and working together to develop programs to address issues related to global pediatric emergency medicine? Such a program was first held in Toronto in 2003 and continues annually. Can you imagine Canadians, Israelis, Jordanians, and Palestinians jointly teaching and developing solutions, via video teleconference, to address behavioral neurological problems affecting elderly populations? Such an initiative began in 2006 and continues to expand today. Can you imagine senior Jordanian and Israeli ear surgeons operating together, successfully carrying out pioneering cochlear implant surgery on deaf infants, on Jordanian national television? Such a surgery was performed in Amman in December 2003. Can you imagine every newborn baby in Jordan having her or his hearing tested? Such a program began in January 2005 as a result of Canadian, Israeli, Palestinian, and Jordanian service, educational, and scientific research cooperation, becoming national health policy in Jordan in 2007. All of this and much more are the result of the Canada International Scientific Exchange Program (CISEPO) and its cooperation network of knowledge