Promoting Healthy Dialogue About the Israel/Hamas War

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Dear SJSU Employees, 

For the past two months we have been inundated with heartbreaking and tragic news over the war between Israel and Hamas. The war has impacted so many of our students, staff and faculty as well as their families and friends, like so many other meaningful events that occur across the country and world. At the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, we have heard staff, faculty, and administrators ask for space to reflect on the impact of the war and support and guidance on how to engage and support healthy conversation. 

The InterGroup Dialogue program (a program of ODEI) would like to invite Staff, Faculty and Administrators to take a moment to reflect on the war, and how we engage in conversation about it. 

Please join us for Promoting Healthy Dialogue About the Israel/Hamas War on Friday, December 15, 2023 from 1:30pm - 3:00pm in the Diaz Compean Student Union, Meeting Room 3. This will be a closed space for SJSU employees only, please register here to attend. 

Our Intentions for this event: 

  • To connect with each other as SJSU employees
  • To reflect on the impacts of the Israel/Hamas war as they may appear
    • in our colleagues
    • in our work places and spaces
    • in our communities
  • To reflect and explore on how we engage in inclusive conversations about the war and avoiding some pitfalls of anti-Jewish and anti-Muslim racist tropes with the assistance of this document

This is not a space to debate or educate others about the War. We are holding space for staff, faculty, and administrators to decide together how to have healthy dialogue about the war. We ask that you respect the intention of this space and will ask you to leave if you cannot honor this intention. 

We will have short content focused presentations for the entire group, and smaller group conversation facilitated by trained facilitators from the InterGroup Dialogue program. A representative from the Employee Assistance Program/Empathia/LifeMatters will be present as well to provide individual mental health support if you need it during this session. 

Register Here

Resources:

Quick Links:

SJSU Resources

Mental Health Resources from Empathia/LifeMatters/Employee Assistance

Policy

Dialogue Resources  

Avoiding Racist Language

Tiertary Education Focus

History

Media 

Bias

Trustworthiness of News

Social Media as a Source for News