Farmar to host basketball clinics for Palestinian and Israeli children through a program

New York, NY - Los Angeles Lakers guard Jordan Farmar, in partnership with the Peres Center for Peace, will be hosting basketball clinics for Israeli and Palestinian children in Israel from August 4-11, 2008. The trip will serve as a follow up to Farmar’s visit in 2006 to the Seeds of Peace camp in Maine. This program uses sports to bring together Israeli and Palestinian children. The children play different sports together, and discuss the shared problems and challenges in their daily lives.

The Peres Center for Peace was founded in 1996 by former Prime Minister Shimon Peres with the intention of motivating historic adversaries in the Middle East to work together to build peace through socio-economic cooperation and development, and people-to-people interaction. At that time the organizations’ president, Ambassador Uri Savir said “It is our goal to encourage peace and to educate today’s youth, who will be tomorrow’s leaders, on the importance of it.”

At the end of the trip, Farmar will be making appearances around the country to cities like Jerusalem and Haifa on behalf of Seeds of Peace and Players Peace International. “Basketball, and sports in general, have the ability to transcend conflict, and are a powerful tool to bring children of all backgrounds together,” said Farmar on the motivation for his travel to Israel. “Bringing these children together while they are young and impressionable and helping them learn how to play and communicate with one another can build bridges of understanding for when they are older.”

Published in : Sports, The Lakers Report