Category Archives: Coexistence

Composing peace as a picture

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Combatants for Peace rally in Beit Jala

Peace-making is an art, an art that demands much skill, patience, a deep, empathetic understanding of the human material of which is peace is made, and willingness to try and fail many times before succeeding. The bi-national Israeli-Palestinian group Combatants for Peace practiced its art of peace-making in its rally against the “Pillar of Cloud” war on Saturday evening, 17thNovember 2012. The movement was started jointly in 2005 by Palestinians and

Israeli contingent marching to Beit Jala

Israelis, who have taken an active part in the cycle of violence; Israelis as soldiers in the Israeli army and Palestinians as part of the armed struggle for Palestinian freedom. Not only have members of the group renounced violence in favour of dialogue and reconciliation, but they have also committed to working together, as former enemies, to achieve an end to the occupation and independence for Palestine alongside Israel.

Before the latest Gaza war broke out last week, Combatants were planning a remarkable event for that evening, a screening on the separation wall of Shelley Hermon’s documentary film, Within the Eye of the Storm. I blogged on another occasion about the Tel Aviv premier of that film. But to show a film about how two former fighters, bereaved by the violence of the occupation, came to be close friends on the very structure that embodies all the forces separating Israelis and Palestinians will be a deeply symbolic event. The war caused the postponement of the event, and in its place Combatants organized a joint demonstration calling for a cease fire and a peaceful resolution of the conflict. Organising such an event in short time is no easy feat. Israelis may not enter Area A of the West Bank, which is under full Palestinian Authority control, without a special permit, while the movement of Palestinians other than within the “islands” that Area A is composed of is restricted by the Israeli military. But a point was found in Beit Jala, by Bethlehem, that enabled access to the Israelis coming for the Tel and Jerusalem area as it is in Area C and which the Palestinian members of Combatants could also reach.

So, we marched separately, about 100 Israelis from where the buses dropped us off on a rural road on the outskirts of Beit Jala in the hilly countryside around Jerusalem, and about 100 Palestinians from within Beit Jala. With only a few onlookers, we Israelis (and others) chanted in Hebrew to those ancient hills: “The people demand a ceasefire,” and “War is a disaster, only peace is the solution.” But along the way, a little peace making had to be done. A couple of Palestinians saw the Israeli flag one member of the group was carrying, and signaled that it be taken down. The Israeli and Palestinian organisers had it seems agreed between themselves that an Israeli flag would be there, but not everyone present was happy with that, or knew about it. The Israeli flag is a symbol of occupation and oppression to Palestinians, not a symbol of Jewish freedom. But by the time we arrived at the meeting point, an acceptable arrangement was found: the two flags were held together. Yet, they were both dwarfed by a huge Palestinian flag being held by the youth across the road at which we met, a fabric affirmation that we were now in Palestine.

Short speeches were read out in Hebrew and Arabic, calling on both sides to cease fire, stop targeting and hurting civilians, stop the incitement, and reach immediately the same agreement that will be reached later in any case but after more casualties and pain. Then the chanting began again, the drummers got their rhythm going, and bodies began to move to it, relaxing the stiffness of two sides standing with placards, banners and flags. One Palestinian kid who was enjoying the rhythm was holding a placard with Netanyahu’s picture and the slogan “Peace refusenik”. Waltzing with Bibi. Maybe the bored Israeli soldiers standing in a line to stop us spilling over into other roads wanted to dance too. It was a Saturday night, after all.

One can’t say we all made peace with each other that day, or had a chance to make friends. The activists of Combatants in their grey tea shirts already knew each other, had worked together, consulting each other frequently to keep the event running as planned. But there we were together, Israelis and Palestinians, at a time of war when it is easiest to care only for one’s own pain and injured and dead, to use it as ground to hate the enemy, to demonize them, to believe that they don’t love their children as much as we do, or that they won’t stop until they’ve killed all of us. There we were, determined to find a place to insist together that the violence stop. But even before it stops, Combatants continue the painstaking work of making peace out of the ruins and desperation that the conflict and occupation have left. Last Saturday night, they another added another quick sketch to their portfolio. With much effort, many more helping hands, disagreements about flags and colours and exactly where to place lines, these sketches could become a tapestry of peace across those hills.

Bombs Over Be’er Sheva

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This piece was written by Rema Kheriya Irshed, a Palestinian Israeli psychotherapist and group facilitator trainer, with Ariel Katz, who studied Middle Eastern Studies at Cornell University and now works as a play therapist. This article was published by the Common Ground News Service (CGNews) in May 2012, and refers to a previous round of military escalation between Israel and Hamas.

Be’er Sheva, Israel – Over a four-day period this March, sirens periodically sounded to warn residents of Be’er Sheva, one of Israel’s largest cities near Gaza, to take shelter from missile attacks.

On the first day when the siren sounded, my son was not home. Panicking, I called his cell phone. There was no answer. I began to pray to Allah and meditate to calm myself and overcome an overwhelming fear for my son’s safety. I went into our reinforced safe room but couldn’t bring myself to close the door without my son inside.

Moments later, he burst into the house, followed by two Jewish friends. I rushed the boys into the safe room and shut the iron door behind them, speaking to my son in Arabic, our native language. I told the boys, in Hebrew, to call home and reassure their mothers that they were safe. I covered
our dog with a blanket. It was enough that the Jewish boys were frightened. At least I could make sure they didn’t get bitten.

When one of the boys refused to call home, my identity as a mother faded into the background so that our national identities could be addressed. One of the boys, Yossi, had never met me before. There was something in his stillness that reminded me that it could be frightening for him to be with Arabs, even from his own community, during an attack. I considered the idea that he may have chosen not to phone home because he didn’t want his mother to know he was with Palestinians.

My thoughts and sympathies stayed with the Jewish mother who did not know where her son was. I could feel that mother’s anxiety, which had been mine only moments before. I insisted the boy text his mother to say he was safe in a shelter. That way, he would be filtering out the difficult information.

I put myself in this teenage boy’s shoes, sitting in a strange room with a Palestinian family while being bombed by Palestinians. I was overwhelmed with the boy’s fear of being trapped in a room full of the “enemy”. Even though it was unnatural for me to speak Hebrew with my family, to put the boy more at ease, I forced myself to do so.

The next day, the school that my son and his friends attend was closed in anticipation of further missile attacks. Though our family is Muslim, we chose to send our son to a Jewish school close to our house. When I returned from work, my son was not at home. Searching for him, I called the mother of the other Jewish boy I had sheltered, whom I knew better, and was told that the boys had all been taken to a local swimming pool. I offered to go pick the boys up and bring them home, and was given the address of the war veterans’ club where the father of one of the boys was a member. I
froze, finding it offensive that the Jewish mother could be so insensitive. I didn’t want my son at a military establishment, out of solidarity with the innocent Palestinians suffering retaliation across the border in Gaza. Then I asked myself, “What is the dilemma? When the mothers took him to that swimming pool, they were not thinking of us as Arabs. We are people looking after each other’s children.”

Both Yossi and I needed to rationalise away the fear of the other’s space, and what it meant about our identities to inhabit it. This complex zooming in and out of focus from background to foreground, from person to group and back again, is crucial to maintaining real relationships. For Yossi, it was hard to differentiate the people who are threatening him from the people protecting him. For myself, it was as natural to protect Yossi as it was to protect my own son.

I empathise with the fear of both Israeli children and the children of Gaza, and with parents’ desperation to keep one’s family safe on both sides of the border. When one’s identity precludes a clear “us” vs. “them”, what becomes clear is the tragedy of this destructive pattern. Only when we recognise that no one wins from terrifying the other will we understand that triumph in battle is not a solution – and that both sides can be winners if we all choose to let each other live in freedom, and with dignity.