Blogger: Mideast Youth - Thinking Ahead
Article: Meeting in Jerusalem - Wasatia
Originaly Posted On: 2007-05-05 17:01:47

About two weeks ago I was invited to meeting by a friend and peace colleague who has a new organization called TRUST (building understanding and trust between
Israelis and Palestinians).
Dr. Mohamed Dajani, the Director of the American Studies Institute at
Al Quds University in Ramallah who made a presentation of
“Big Dreams, Small Hopes” and a presentation about Wasatia (Moderation) which is a new Palestinian organization of Moderate Islam that he has founded. He began his lecture by telling us he was alot more radical in his younger years, joining up with Fatah between the years 1967-1975, with a familiar “it’s either us or them” attitude. I say “familiar” because when I first came to Israel from Canada I had the exact same attitude. It wasn’t until he came to know Israelis on a human level that he no longer thought of them as enemies. Yup. Same thing happened to me over 4 years ago when I first met Palestinians - I also no longer thought of them as enemies - even though we met during the height of the 2nd intifada. This Dejani guy and I seemed like kindred spirits.
He asked us - “What is more important? Big dreams or small hopes?” He reported that with the Palestinian media you won’t see the victims of a Palestinian suicide bomber and generally in Palestinian textbooks there is a denial of the State of Israel, not showing Jewish holy sites, etc. And Israeli textbooks don’t mention much of what goes on in the Palestinian side of things either. So both sides prefer to be ignorant of the other. This we all knew.
He showed us propaganda slides from both sides - on the Israeli side, you see photos of the Temple Mount with the 3rd temple rebuilt - but no Dome of the Rock. On the Palestinian side, you see a slide showing an El Al plane loaded with “new Israelis” like myself - taking us all back to the cities of Europe and US from which we came. He said that current Palestinian education teaches Palestinians to love a place that doesn’t exist any more. And Israeli textbooks show Arabs as backwards and unproductive.
So how does one move on from this? One must “think out of the box”, he says. Less focus on the past but not let it dominate the future. We should teach religious commonalities and cultural commonalities. Learn historical narratives of the other. Stop blaming each other. Forgive. Initiative massive people-to-people activities.
So, on Wednesday, while I was with my Palestinian friend who got a permit to come to Jerusalem and I was taking her around to sell her embroidered crafts (which her women’s organization makes) to high-end hotel gift shops, there was a joint Jewish-Palestinian activity going on in the Sheikh Saed neighborhood just outside Jerusalem where both peoples were protesting the wall going up and dividing that neighborhood. This was a family event and people brought their children. And I do think that when we help each other out and support each other like this, the “higher ups” in the Israeli government may just listen - for once.
Blog, Events, General, Interfaith, Israel, Palestine

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