{"id":305249,"date":"2025-10-20T12:01:23","date_gmt":"2025-10-20T11:01:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=305249"},"modified":"2025-10-19T07:28:59","modified_gmt":"2025-10-19T06:28:59","slug":"the-impact-of-nonviolent-accompaniment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2025\/10\/the-impact-of-nonviolent-accompaniment\/","title":{"rendered":"The Impact of Nonviolent Accompaniment"},"content":{"rendered":"

16 Oct 2025 – <\/em>Third-party nonviolent intervention is the physical presence\u00a0 of a third party into an area of conflict in such a way as to reduce the level of violence.\u00a0 Accompaniment of persons in danger was developed as a technique in the early 1980s by Peace Brigades International (PBI), which I represented in Geneva, especially in contacts with persons at the United Nations.\u00a0 Peace Brigades sent volunteers, mostly from the U.S.A. to El Salvador and Guatemala.<\/p>\n

Later, in 1989, during a wave of killing of lawyers in Sri Lanka, the Sri Lankan bar association invited PBI to send a team there to accompany lawyers.\u00a0 The protective accompaniment worked so well that PBI was asked to extend its work to labor organizers and journalists, also under danger.<\/p>\n

Similar forms of protective accompaniment have been organized by two largely Christian organizations ro work with Palestinians.\u00a0 One is the World Council of Churches, based in Geneva, which began a program in 2002.\u00a0 Since then, some 2,000 volunteers from 21 countries have spent three months in Israel to accompany children going to school or persons passing through multiple check points.<\/p>\n

The second organization is the Christian Peacemakers Teams, closely related to the Mennonite church in Canada and the U.S.A. working in the Hebron area since 1995, a mixed Palestinian and Israeli community.\u00a0 When active, they have a red hat which is a clear identification.<\/p>\n

Christian Peacemaker Teams have also worked in other parts of Israel with mixed communities.\u00a0 Allies from other countries send messages and emails to Israeli officials in support of the Team’s efforts.\u00a0 The team uses videos to highlight tense situations, often associated with house demolitions.\u00a0 The Peacemaker teams have developed good working relations with Israeli human rights organizations such as Rabbis for Human Rights. The team members are often arrested by the Israeli police and spend time in Israeli jails with prisoners who are not used to nonviolent activists.<\/p>\n

As one Christian Peacemaker, Wendy Lehman, wrote “Intellectually, I knew there were good reasons to risk arrest when doing nonviolent direct action.\u00a0 Many activists view it as an effective way to draw attention to injustice.\u00a0 Others argue that if you are doing what you believe is right – defending someone from being beaten by soldiers, participating in a public vigil, or standing up for a rightful landowner – arrest may occur ‘organically’ out of the situation.”<\/p>\n

Developing the skills needed for nonviolent accompaniment is crucial.\u00a0 Volunteers need awareness and skills to be able to act judiciously and have an impact.\u00a0 They must be able to observe, evaluate and make decisions.\u00a0 They can be facilitators – one who helps a group reach a common decision, often with consensus decision-making and participatory management.<\/p>\n

To keep a clear focused attention in the middle of violence, hate and confusion requires inner calm.\u00a0 There are techniques, often developed in spiritual training, to be able to stay calm and focused in times of confusion.\u00a0 There are also ways of developing an inner vitality so that one ‘s vital energy is not drained away by the presence of hostile persons.\u00a0 Such techniques are usually related to increasing the flow of subtle energies within the body, techniques taught in yoga, in certain breathing exercises, and in meditation.\u00a0 In a more secular spirit, the International Committee of the Red Cross has been working on stress reduction techniques for Red Cross workers in tension situations.<\/p>\n

The current situation in Israel, while there are positive currents, is one of continuing tensions.\u00a0 Thus, there will be a need for nonviolent accompaniment.<\/p>\n

______________________________________<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> Ren\u00e9 Wadlow is a member of the <\/em>TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment<\/a>. He <\/em>is President of the Association of World Citizens, an international peace organization with consultative status with ECOSOC, the United Nations organ facilitating international cooperation and problem-solving in economic and social issues<\/em>, and <\/em>editor of <\/em>Transnational Perspectives.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

16 Oct 2025 – Third-party nonviolent intervention is the physical presence\u00a0 of a third party into an area of conflict in such a way as to reduce the level of violence.\u00a0 Accompaniment of persons in danger was developed as a technique in the early 1980s by Peace Brigades International, which I represented in Geneva.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":244689,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[88,444,1243,3641,126],"class_list":["post-305249","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-transcend-members","tag-israel","tag-nonviolence","tag-nonviolent-action","tag-peace-brigades-international-pbi","tag-violence"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=305249"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305249\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":305250,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305249\/revisions\/305250"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/244689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=305249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=305249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=305249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}