By the end of the 1990s, the primary school had become a “state school” and by the 2010s, enrolment from surrounding areas increased the student population to over 200 pupils, with children arriving each day from 20 different localities. Despite expansion, the school team kept to the original concept of a truly binational school, with equal numbers of Palestinians and Jews, and with two teachers in the classroom, so that students would learn in both languages.
The Bilingual, Binational Primary School / Rosh-HaShanah-Celebration-2007.09.12
In March, 2015, the PSCC convened a conference in memory of rescuers during times of genocide or ethnic cleansing. This conference would lead to the establishment of the Garden of Rescuers two years later, and the annual Rescuers Day event.
During this period, the idea arose to create a peace museum. This space, in the ground floor of the library, became the Oasis Art Gallery, which mounted exhibits in which Palestinian and Jewish artists showed their work side by side.
Fire was always a risk for the village surrounded by forests, but in Sept 2020, village members awoke in the early hours of the morning to fire engines coming to douse the flames in the School for Peace. Much of the building was burned down in the fire, which had started by arson. The library, opposite, and the Gallery, suffered fire damage as well.
With help from 19 different donors, the renovation of the School for Peace building was completed in 2023.
Also completed in 2023 were the renovated nursery building, the Language Center in the primary school – the first of its kind, which will undoubtedly bring others to learn and adopt its concept – and the completion of the infrastructure works for a new neighborhood that will double the number of families living in the village. Many of the new members are second-generation — young parents who want their children to grow up in the same multicultural, anti-racists atmosphere they, themselves, enjoyed.
