Grassroots International

The best way for Palestinians to avoid expulsion from their lands and retain their homes is to intensively work the land.

From a small village in the central plateau to forgotten towns in the north and south, grassroots organizers are demonstrating that their solutions are the way towards a new Haiti.

Just after dawn, close to 100 Israeli military personnel had arrived in the village without warning and uprooted roughly 1,000 trees -- bringing with them around 40 specialists to ensure that the plants were ripped from the root, according to the villagers.

In late 2009, Gaza's first seed bank was established and opened. Since then, more than 200 registered women members of the Rural Women's Development Society have established 10 seed-saving units benefiting upwards of 1000 people.

Down south in the Negev desert, increasing militarization is constant --at least 80% of the land there is used for military training purposes, including weaponry development.

Haiti's development plan shouldn't be identical to that of Rwanda, but what the two countries do have in common are local solutions to unthinkable problems.