Once upon a time there was neither a Jewish people nor a Palestinian people. Millions of years ago this land was home to dinosaurs. Thousands of years ago, Neanderthals lived here. 10,000 years ago, Homo Sapiens already reached this land. But none of these people familiar to us existed back then. There were neither French nor Germans, neither Jews nor Palestinians. Time creates nations. We can argue when exactly the Jewish people and the Palestinian people emerged. But the important thing is that right now both are here.
Unfortunately, too many of us refuse to acknowledge this simple fact. That there are both a Jewish people and a Palestinian people living in this land, that both peoples have a deep historical and spiritual connection to this place, and that both have a right to exist here.
The bitter truth about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is that each side fears that the other is trying to annihilate it, and both sides are right. Our fear that the Palestinians want to make us disappear is correct. And the fear of Palestinians that we want to make them disappear is also correct. This isnโt paranoia. It is a fact. In its Document of Principles and Policies Hamas declares the โland which extends from the River Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea, from Ras Al-Naqurah in the north to Umm Al-Rashrash in the south, belongs only to the Palestinian peopleโ, and it doesnโt recognize any connection or right Jews may have to this land. The current Israeli government declares in its own list of key principles that โThe Jewish people has an exclusive and inalienable right to all parts of the land of Israel.โ Each side believes that the whole land belongs to it alone. โWhat have Jews got to do with Jerusalem?โ ask many Palestinians in all seriousness. โThere is no such thing as Palestiniansโ, argue many Israelis with equal earnestness.
They have eyes but they do not see. They have ears, but they do not hear. How can we account for such a level of denial? Well, reality is actually complex and vast, but our minds are often narrow and small. It is hard to squeeze a lot of reality into a little mind. So what do small minds do? They try to make what they cannot contain disappear. โI cannot contain this,โ says the mind, โso it must disappear!โ. The attempt to make entire slices of reality disappear, entire peoples โ is what fuels the cycle of blood and fear, which grows worse with each passing year. As small minds try to destroy what they cannot contain, they close down and shrink even further. They become so self-absorbed.
But the truth is that the world is vast, and even this narrow strip of land between the Mediterranean and the Jordan river, is big enough for two peoples. There is no objective shortage of territory here. There is enough space between the Mediterranean and the Jordan river to build houses, roads, factories, schools and hospitals for everyone.
We suffer not from the narrowness of the land, but from the narrowness of the mind. But each of us can expand our minds, for the mind of each and every person can be vast. A single mind can contain a whole world. Each side should recognize the existence of the other, letting go of the fantasy that they donโt exist, or that one day we can make them disappear. Peace will come only when both Palestinians and Israelis can honestly say, that even if one day we have the power to do so โ we would not wish to destroy the other side. No matter how right we are, we would not wish to destroy the other side. No matter how right we are, and no matter what they did to us, they are still a part of reality, and they have a right to live with security and dignity in the country of their birth, because they are humans just like us.
Between human beings, there are many ideological disputes, but we all share the same feelings and needs. All humans, whether in Gaza or Tel Aviv, in Hebron or in Acre, are thirsty for water, for harmony, for truth and for love. Is there any person who doesnโt need water, who does not want peace of mind, who does not want to know the truth about life, or who does not want to love and be loved? Filling this thirst isnโt always easy, too many of us look for peace of mind through struggle, try to find truth by spreading lies, and think that it is possible to buy the love of God or the love of humanity โ in coins of hatred and violence. It is like people who fill their thirst for water in a lake of fire.
But it is never too late to make amends. War isnโt a law of nature โ it is a human choice. And at any moment, it is possible to make a different choice, and start to make peace. True, we have tried to make peace in the past, and we werenโt good at it. So what? We havenโt been that good at making war either, which doesnโt prevent us from making another one, and another one. All these wars have led us to the abyss. It is time to give peace another chance. Remember, war is the attempt by small minds to eradicate the complexity of reality. Peace is large, it contains multitudes.
