Parents Circle – Families Forum | Picturing Peace

Once again the ongoing tension between the Israeli government and Hamas has deteriorated into a massive, asymmetrical exchange of airborne explosives inflicted mostly on civilians. Last time, in November 2012, the Israeli military code for the “operation” was Pillar of Cloud/Pillar of Defense. Then as now the terminology varied between Hebrew and English, so now we have tzuk eitan (steadfast cliff) in Hebrew and Protective Edge in English. Who knows why. The current outburst of violence punctuates the persistent variation of armed conflict between the Israeli state and the Palestinian enclave of Gaza since the first mortar shell was fired from Gaza into Israel in 2001. We’re now up to the seventh Israeli operation to contain the launch of more than 8,500 Palestinian rockets, resulting in 4845 Palestinian dead and 174 Israelis, according to Ha’aretz. Probably somebody could estimate the mass of Israeli ordinance that has landed in Gaza, but the number would obscure the extension of destruction to Gazan property and prosperity brought about the Israeli-Egyptian siege. The siege hasn’t fulfilled its stated purpose of preventing the build-up of rockets in Gaza, only the rebuilding of homes and infrastructure after each explosion of destruction.

The code names of the Israeli military operation are much less significant than the conception of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in which they occur: conflict management. Sage “realists” who live in think tanks have concluded that the conflict is too intractable to be “resolved,” as the Oslo process has collapsed and subsequent efforts to revive it and the associated “two state solution” such as the Kerry initiative have failed too. The best we can hope for, they tell us, is that temporary accommodations can be found that minimize the degree of armed conflict. No more wars between states, only “low intensity conflict” between Israel and its chief current enemies, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Hizbullah and other “non-state actors.” So, you see, peace may be impossible, but war has been rebranded. The logic of conflict management shapes Prime Minister Netanyahu’s and the Israeli government’s relationship to Gaza and its Hamas leadership. Absent the option of a peace agreement with the Palestinians (which is blamed on the Palestinians), the best alternative is to deter the “non-state actor” Hamas from, well, acting other than as Israel wants, which is to disappear. So it’s within the rules of conflict management to punish Hamas as a whole, and any inhabitants of Gaza who are unfortunate enough to get in the way, with a dose of “low intensity conflict” for the murder of the three Israeli teenagers kidnapped in the occupied Palestinian territories. And as Hamas responded with some “low intensity conflict” themselves, the conflict requires some more intense conflict management from the Israeli side, and so on, until things calm down for a while. Neither side really wanted the escalation, we’re told, so it’s just a question of time until they manage to find their way out. Sorry about the death and destruction until normal management is restored.

IAF strike on Gaza (Photo: EPA)

The “realists” who adhere to the doctrine of conflict management are not realists at all. The reality of conflict management is what is happening now. It is families in Gaza buried under rubble, and a lot more rubble. It is enormous and inevitable “collateral damage” (dead and injured people) of an Israeli operation that treats homes as legitimate military targets (“terrorist infrastructure). It is an Israeli pensioner who suffered a heart attack trying to get to shelter from indiscriminate rockets fired by Hamas and Islamic Jihad. It is civilians in fear of what is falling from the skies. This is what conflict management looks like.

House destroyed by rocket in Beersheva. Photo by Herzl Yoseph

The asymmetry between the Palestinian and Israel casualties is immense, but it’s not a question of arithmetic. This low intensity conflict isn’t tolerable for Israeli civilians. It’s not so easy to manage shock and trauma, let alone physical injury, when you don’t live in a think tank. If you live in the confines of Gaza, there is nowhere to escape. This is what conflict management looks like.

Parents Circle Families Forum – Peace Square, July 2014

There are some realists around, among the few voices in Israel that dissent from the mainstream discussion about how much military force should be deployed to manage the “non-state actors.” They might not look like realists at first sight. When everyone else is thinking about shelters that can withstand rockets, they put up a tent in a square. The Israeli Palestinian Bereaved Families for Peace, also known as The Parents Circle – Family Forum, have created a public space for peace in the midst of the war.

Poster for Parents Circle “Peace Square”

“We, Israelis and Palestinians who have lost loved ones in the ongoing conflict take it on ourselves to be a sign of reconciliation and dialogue.” They invite the public to join them, to listen, to discuss, for support. Based on their own experience of finding a way from their deepest pain to the pain of their enemy, they express their conception of conflict resolution in a slogan: “it won’t stop until we talk” (in Hebrew this rhymes as: ze lo y’gamer im lo n’daber). The horrific episodes of death falling from the skies won’t stop until there is a negotiation peace, a peace that the “realists” have given up on. The Parents Circle enact the difficult, painful reconciliation on the ground that is peace itself and paves the way for negotiation peace. That sounds realistic to me, a reality in which people can live.

Sadat and Begin image by Peace Factory on facebook

Parents Circle image on Crack in Wall facebook page

Peace Factory image on facebook

There is thunder in Tel Aviv as I write this piece, but not the thunder of war, only of the heavens. The ceasefire between Israel and Gaza that began at 9 pm last night is still just about holding (there is a report on twitter already of a Palestinian shot and injured by Israeli troops as he approached the security fence), and the stormy weather can become news again. In my last post, I called for a ceasefire on social media, for an end to the exchange of hostile, hateful imagery of Israelis and Palestinians targeted at each other on facebook and twitter. From what I see on blogs, tweets and sites that I follow, that has to a large extent happened for now, in the wake of the military ceasefire. The Palestinians have more mourning and rebuilding to do than Israelis, among whom there is some disappointment that the army didn’t reinvade Gaza to end the missile threat once and for all. The conflict between Israelis and Palestinians is far from over, whether on the ground or on social media, and so the demonization of the Other as hateful by nature, and thus undeserving of peace, will go on too.

Social media during the war have not only been the terrain of hostile electronic propagandizing, the waging of war through hateful images. Social media have also been a field for peace-making, not only for explicit calls for a ceasefire, but also for images of peace between Israelis and Palestinians. One of the Israeli-Palestinian groups that called for an immediate ceasefire is The Parents Circle – Family Forum (PCFF, also called Israeli Palestinian Bereaved Families for Peace). It is a joint Palestinian Israeli grassroots organization of over 600 families, all of whom have lost a close family member as a result of the prolonged conflict. Through their facebook page titled A Crack in the Wall, PCFF kept up their strategy of seeking peace through reconciliation. They recirculated their slogan “it won’t stop until we talk” (in Hebrew this rhymes as: ze lo y’gamer im lo n’daber) and asked visitors to use it as their cover picture. While the electronic propagandists were circulating photographs of casualties on “their” side, PCFF posted pictures that juxtaposed the suffering and destruction on both sides, underlined with the message that:

“The Israeli Palestinian Bereaved Families Forum shares in the grief of the bereaved families, who join a long line of victims of the conflict. We hope and wish the injured on both sides a speedy recovery.”

In their express call for a ceasefire, PCFF expressed concern for the civilians on both sides, pointing out that “anger and frustration only fuel the already existing fire of fear and hatred.” The families hope to “serve as a bridge beyond hatred and fear by declaring their willingness to work together towards reconciliation between peoples despite their deep loss.”

Another constant stream of images of people refusing to see each other as enemies came through the “Israel-Loves-Iran” facebook page, along with its various offshoots, “Palestine-Loves-Israel” and “Israel-Loves-Palestine.” Following their typical format, there were lots of photographs of Israelis, Palestinians and others bearing the words: “Please stop the war.” They also marked the anniversary of President Sadat’s visit to Jerusalem in 1977 with a photograph of him meeting Prime Minister Begin, and a series of superimposed statements they made about war and peace.

The images of Israelis and Palestinians recognizing each other’s grief, pain, aspirations and hopes, acknowledging that the other wants peace, independence and security as much as one’s own side, were not those most visible amid the explosive flashes of the war. They may seem naïve, kitschy, obvious. Doesn’t everyone prefer peace to war? Isn’t the problem far more complex than a simple demand to ceasefire and live in peace can address? True, peace-making isn’t simple, and it’s proved elusive between Israel and Palestine in spite of the hope raised by the 1993 Oslo agreements. But to make peace we have to picture it, and we have to see, to imagine those we call our enemies as people who deserve peace as much as we do. See the peace you want there to be.

Picturing Peace

Israeli Images of Peace

Tag Archives: Parents Circle – Families Forum

This is what “conflict management” looks like

Ceasefire on social media (part two)