peace

Pondering peace post-Oct. 7

Commemorations of individuals murdered at the Nova festival. (photo by Pat Johnson)

Since I returned home to Vancouver from Israel a few weeks ago, it has taken me time to write about my reflections. There’s the usual getting over jetlag, catching up with work, dealing with the odds and ends that pile up after a five-week absence. I have also experienced a degree of avoidance. In some ways, there is so much to say I don’t know where to begin. In other ways, what can I possibly say that hasn’t been said before?

Unlike Israelis, I have had the luxury of putting my head in the sand, to some extent, in the days since I returned to my ridiculously quiet suburban home. My experiences – including a visit to the Gaza Envelope, Kibbutz Re’im and the Nova festival site, and conversations with scores of Israelis – have been percolating. In recent days, I have been immersed in video testimonies and other reports from survivors of the Oct. 7 attacks.

One of the reasons I have avoided writing so far, I think, is that the parallel I feel compelled to make is one that I hate to invoke. I intentionally avoid making comparisons with the Holocaust, as almost any contrast cheapens the sanctity of that event’s memory. It also is unavoidably an exaggeration – nothing can compare to the Holocaust. And so, we should not be in the business of raising false equivalencies.

But not everyone subscribes to my hesitancy. More than one Israeli I spoke to referred to Kibbutz Be’eri as “Auschwitz.”

Although I was guided around the sites of the Oct. 7 atrocities by a senior Israeli military official, we were denied entry to Be’eri, which came as a relief. I didn’t want to make the choice not to go in, but I was glad that decision was made for me.

I had to ask myself – as other people asked me – why I was compelled to visit these places in the first place? I had not, for example, taken the opportunity to watch the footage that screened in Vancouver last year of the most terrible carnage from Oct. 7. I believed that I knew enough of what happened that I did not need to be exposed to the images so graphically. (There are people, on the other hand, who I think should be forced to watch such footage.)

I could say no to the video but, in Israel, I felt an obligation to bear witness in what small way I could by visiting the Nova festival site and other locations, including Highway 232. My guide, who was among the first on the scene during the morning of Oct. 7, provided (as you can imagine) a jarring play-by-play of what he witnessed, saw, heard and smelled that day.

As I watch documentaries and continue to read about the events, and hear from eyewitnesses, including those who defended their kibbutzim, and military personnel who were among the first on the scene, it is almost impossible for the mind not to go to historical parallels.

I hear stories of people pretending to be dead for hours while murderous attackers surrounded them. Testimony recounts the nonchalant murder of the elderly, babies, anyone and everyone the terrorists could kill – as well as the collaboration of “ordinary” civilians.

The ripping apart of families. Parents shielding their children from gunshots. Families huddling as they are engulfed in flames. Survivors’ stories of screams still ringing in their ears. Jews recalling what they were sure were the last moments of their life. Acts of brutality that defy human imagination. Sadistic jubilation while perpetrating acts that make most people recoil. Residents of a village reconnoitring after the catastrophe to determine who remains alive.

The parallels are, to me at least, unavoidable.

There is, of course, a quantitative chasm between this modern horror and that of the Shoah. It is this difference that also makes comparisons so incredibly problematic. But it is the qualitative experiences, the grotesque similarities between Nazi atrocities and those of Hamas, that force the mind to go in that direction.

While visiting Jerusalem, I stumbled upon a pathway that begins at Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial museum and research centre, and winds through the military cemeteries in which the casualties of Israel’s successive defensive wars and endless terror attacks are buried, as are most of the country’s prime ministers, presidents and other leading figures. The pathway ends at the tomb of Theodor Herzl, the man most credited with making real the dream of a Jewish state, and adjacent to the museum that tells his life story.

The message here is that, from the moral abyss of the Holocaust to the sustaining of national self-determination as envisioned by Herzl, the path has had an unimaginable human cost.

The promise of the state of Israel, in Herzl’s mind, was that a people who were no longer stateless would not be subject to the predations of their brutalizing neighbours. Like so much else Herzl envisioned – he imagined that Jews would be welcomed for the positive contributions they bring to the region – a state has not ushered in the lasting peace for which he had hoped.

photo - An empty Shabbat table set for missing loved ones at Hostages Square in Tel Aviv — An empty Shabbat table set for missing loved ones at Hostages Square in Tel Aviv. *(photo by Pat Johnson)*

We have known this since the moment Israel’s independence was declared and the new country was immediately invaded by the massed armies of its neighbouring countries. The Arab states unanimously rejected coexistence and soon Jews from across the Middle East and North Africa were expelled or otherwise forced to flee, most finding a home in the new Jewish state. The Arabs who were not within Israel’s border at the time of the 1949 ceasefire – and their generations of descendants – have been held as stateless people ever since in one of history’s most cynical acts.

What is still able to shock, even in a world where we have become inured to inhumanity, is that there are people who experience joy at Jewish death and thrill at the opportunity to torture, terrorize and kill Jews. A state has not removed that possibility from the world.

If there was one single objective for the existence of a Jewish state, this was it: the basic security of the Jewish person. On Oct. 7, that promise was broken.

While many Israelis told me that Oct. 7 demonstrated that coexistence with Palestinians is impossible, other people told me that it merely made them redouble their commitment to building a future of peace and coexistence. If I went back to those who said Oct. 7 taught us to work harder for peace with Palestinians, would they see a cognitive dissonance in my position as I do with theirs?

If the existence of a Jewish state cannot prevent the most basic thing it was created to realize, is the entire enterprise a failure?

A Jewish state does not guarantee, obviously, that Jews will not still and again experience the atrocities that have befallen them historically. It is, nevertheless, the best defence, however imperfect.

The Israelis who told me they must work harder for peace believe that, when our ideal falls short, rather than give up, we have to do more to attain it. For them, that means doubling down on peace activism. I admire their idealism.

For me, any realistic plan for peace is worthy of consideration. But I will also double down and say that the answer to a Jewish state that fails to live up to its core mission of keeping Jewish people from reliving the horrors of the past is also not to give up – but to continue building a Jewish state that is impermeable, unparalleled in strength and impervious to the genocidal assaults of its neighbours.

Reflecting on the thousands I saw buried along the pathway between Yad Vashem and Herzl’s tomb, I believe that, until Israel’s neighbours are incapable of the sorts of atrocities we have seen, Israelis must work for peace, on the one hand, while assuming their neighbours won’t change, on the other.

Security through peace

Noa in conversation with Rabbi Dan Moskovitz at Temple Sholom Oct. 30. (screenshot)

Israeli singer/songwriter and peace activist Achinoam Nini (Noa) was in British Columbia recently to do a Vipassana meditation. While here, she stopped at Temple Sholom Oct. 30 for a conversation with Rabbi Dan Moskovitz (which is on YouTube) and at Congregation Emanu-El Nov. 4 for a talk with Rabbi Harry Brechner.

Noa was born in Israel in 1969. She’s the fifth generation of her family in Israel, their presence dating back to the mid-1800s. They immigrated from Yemen.

“They came because they were persecuted at the time and they came to the only place they knew, that their heart drew them to, and that was Jerusalem and the Kinneret,” she said. “That was the two places. They walked across the desert and took boats and were smuggled by Bedouins. It’s a very dramatic story, how the family made it to the Holy Land.”

Noa’s father got a scholarship to study at the University of Rochester, so she spent the first couple of years of her life in Rochester, NY.

“When I went into first grade, my family moved to the Bronx, NY. My dad was now doing his PhD in Columbia University. And my parents decided to send my brother and I to yeshivah…. I was the only dark-skinned kid in the school, the only Israeli kid in the school, the only family that didn’t live in something that looked like a mansion.

“My way of dealing was in two ways,” said Noa. “First, fortunately, I was a gifted student, so I had a scholarship to school that helped my parents…. And music. I started writing songs at a very young age…. I was interested in physics and mathematics, I loved history. I wanted to go to Harvard and do a PhD in physics and history, but that didn’t happen, obviously. Music … chose me.”

At age 17, on a summer vacation in Israel, Noa met a soldier on leave.

“I went back home,” she said. “I told my parents, I’m making aliyah. I said, you raised me to be a Zionist. We love Israel. I want to live in Israel.”

To this day, Noa is married to that man (Asher Barak, now a medical specialist and entrepreneur), and they have three children, two of whom are in the Israel Defence Forces, one in service, the other in the reserves.

Noa did her army service in a military entertainment unit, then started her music career. While at the Rimon School of Music, she met Gil Dor, who was one of her teachers. “He’s an extraordinary and amazing, brilliant musician and we’ve been working together now for 34 years,” said Noa.

They caught the attention of guitarist Pat Metheny, who produced Noa’s first album and brought it to David Geffen, who then signed Noa at Geffen Records.

“I started performing abroad and foreign journalists started asking me my opinion about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and I’m like, I’m an artist, I don’t speak about things like that, don’t ask me questions like that.”

But she didn’t feel good about not responding. “And so, I started learning more and reading more and I became more and more depressed,” she said. “And then came Yitzchak Rabin and he started talking about peace. And I was like, yes, this is great!”

A believer in the Oslo Accords, Noa was the only leading Israeli musician to agree to perform at the peace rally where Rabin was murdered.

“I saw Rabin and I hugged him … and I walked down the stairs. Ten minutes later, he walked down the stairs and was killed…. I remember the rush and the cry and everybody running, and panic, and myself running and pushing to see what had happened,” Noa shared. “It was a trauma. I haven’t recovered, absolutely not. I haven’t recovered – and neither has Israel.”

At that moment, said Noa, “I said, OK, well, if this guy just paid with his life for our future, the future of Israel, the future of my children, then I, too, can do something. And then, maybe, I’ll pay a price and that’ll be OK because it’s the right thing to do. And that’s when I started becoming an activist for peace.”

There were two other life-changing events for Noa in the 1990s. She was invited to sing at the Vatican for Pope John Paul II and she was asked to write the lyrics and sing the theme song of the film Life is Beautiful (La Vita e Bella), which won an Oscar.

Among her many achievements, Noa represented Israel in the Eurovision Song Contest in 2009. She did so with Palestinian-Israeli singer/songwriter Mira Awad. “I wrote a song called ‘There Must Be Another Way,’ and we sang it in English, Hebrew and Arabic,” said Noa. “It made a lot of waves around the world and I have to say that, until today, it is taught in schools around the world.”

She related a story about that experience.

“Mira, her mother is from Bulgaria and her father is Palestinian. She’s quite fair-skinned, with green eyes. My family is from Yemen…. I’m an Arabic Jew. And so, when we sat in front of media, I remember there was one day where they had BBC Iran, they had Al Jazeera, they had all kinds of media…. All the Arab media immediately came up to me in Arabic and to her in English, [assuming] she’s the Jew. And so, I told them, you see, that is the role of art – our role is to shake you up a little. You think you understand everything. Maybe you don’t. Maybe there’s another way of looking at it…. You can’t think that you understand everything about everything. No, it’s not black and white. And that’s, of course, very relevant to where we are today.”

That said, there has been progress towards peace, she contended.

“There’s a huge polemic about whether there should be or there shouldn’t be a Palestinian state,” she admitted, “but there is a conversation being had about it…. In the past, it was not even talked about at all. It was underground.”

She also pointed to the many organizations that work with and/or are staffed by Arabs and Jews. Noa is on the boards of the Arava Institute and the Umm el-Fahem Museum of Art, for example. She’s also involved with the Parents Circle – Families Forum.

“The world in general is not a great place for people who believe in peace right now,” she acknowledged. “I think that we are under attack by forces, if you like, forces of darkness from everywhere. But, like I always say, that’s not reason enough not to continue raising the voice…. I believe in peace. I don’t see any other way to live. Has the peace camp changed? It has transformed in many ways.”

She gave the example of a WhatsApp group called Voices of Solidarity. She said a lot of young people are doing things – “it’s either art, it’s underground theatre, it’s alternative music.” She mentioned the organization Standing Together.

“Yitzhak Rabin, when he started talking to [Yasser] Arafat, the terrorist, everyone was like, what, no way, forget it. Seventy-five percent of the Israeli public were against any kind of interaction with Palestinians but then he came [along] with his charisma and his leadership and his integrity and his honesty and his track record, and he started saying, we’re going to be doing this and this is the right thing and this is for Israel’s future, for our children, we’ve made enough wars…. And then, it was like a month later, the entire public opinion, it shifted towards being positive about the chances for peace.”

That could happen again. A change in circumstances, a particular leader’s personality, the right timing, she said.

For Noa, Israel is in a worse situation now than immediately after Oct. 7.

“The hostage situation … is a nightmare beyond words. I go every week, sometimes I go twice a week, three times a week, to stand with them [the families and others calling for the hostages to be brought home]…. They’re desperate. I don’t know how they are still sane…. And the fact that that their children are still there [in Gaza], that they haven’t been brought back, that not everything has been done to bring them back, is not anything that Israel will ever recover from.”

She is appalled that the government is still in power.

“Not only did they not resign,” she said, “they then turned around to blame everybody that saved Israel, including Brothers and Sisters in Arms, including all the organizations that volunteered, [and] to blame the hostage families for daring to want their children back…. It’s beyond words.”

She advised diaspora Jews to distance themselves from the government: “separate the Israeli government from the Israeli people, it’s not the same thing,” she said.

“If you are going to look at a lot of consistent polls, you’ll see that people – even people that voted for the present government – feel betrayed by what the government has eventually done. They don’t understand how the government is not taking responsibility. They don’t understand how the dictatorship coup keeps moving forward when we’re in such a stressful situation. They don’t understand how our relationship with the entire world has come to a complete collapse under the auspices of this government. The Israeli government right now is the enemy of the Israeli people. And you can say that…. We support the Israeli people, we support the country of Israel, but we do not support the government of Israel.”

She warned of the dangers extremists pose in any country, and asked people to “strengthen the moderates in civil society in any way you can.”

She added, “Throughout history, countries have fallen into terrible situations of leadership. Italy, my favourite country in the world after Israel, became a fascist country at some point, with Mussolini, and there was Franco [in Spain] and there were other people, other countries that came into [similar] situations. Does that delegitimize the country? No. It means that a certain combination of events led to the fact that a country was now held hostage by leadership that did not work in her benefit. That is what is happening right now to Israel, and we have to work through it together with the help of our friends, and you are our friends.”

Noa doesn’t just fault the Israeli government. “In my opinion,” she said, “everybody in the region is to blame for the horrible situation we’re in. Nobody made the efforts. The leadership did not make efforts to make peace, not Israeli leadership, definitely not Palestinian leadership.”

She believes Israel had to defend itself after Oct. 7.

“What were we supposed to do? Sit around [twiddling our thumbs] while our kids were being massacred and our women were being raped? Yes, Israel needed to go in. The war was legitimate. But – it was legitimate to the extent that there was a plan. There needs to be a plan. Say, we have to fight, but now, let’s see, we’ve attacked, we’ve retaliated, we’ve done this, we’ve shown that, we’re there for our people. But we have to bring the hostages back…. Second, we have to see, who are our allies? We’re a small country, we’re nine million people – whoa, we want to attack the entire world? No. Who are our allies? Who are our friends? How can we start progressing towards a solution to this? Not endless warfare. Who are the people that want to talk to us? The UAE, the Saudis, the Americans, the Europeans, let’s reach out to them. This is what the Israeli government should have done immediately.”

While acknowledging that Israel needs a strong army, Noa said, “at the same time, parallel institutions need to come in and do their job, the diplomatic job, to reach out to our friends … and make sure that Israel is secure. Our security will come with peace, only with peace, and we have to look at this as an opportunity to make peace. And are there partners? There are.”

She said, “As a woman who lives in Israel, loves Israel and sends her kids to the army…. We need to be able to look forward to a time when we will not be sending our children to the army. Is it possible? Yes.”

המשבר הגדול של מדינת נתניהו יגיע עוד יגיע

לאחרונה דיבר עם חבר מישראל דוד שטויר, כאשר בגילו המתקדם (שבעים פלוס) כבר חווה הכל במדינה. אני הכרתי את דוד בחודשים הראשונים שלי בתהליך התאקלמות בוונקובר, אליה עברתי בחודש פברואר 2005

דוד חזר וציין בפני שאני הייתי “נביא” שראה לאן פני ישראל מועדות והוא עד היום מצטער שלא עזב כמוני את המדינה בה גדלנו, למען עתיד טוב יותר לו ולילדיו. לאור המשבר הקשה בישראל ילדיו של דוד כבר הספיקו לעזוב את ישראל. ולכן שאלתי אותו מה עוד “מחזיק” אותו בישראל? הוא ענה לי כי בתו הצעירה שהשתחחרה לאחרונה ההצבא, נקראה לשירות מילואים דחוף בן מספר חודשים בחיל האוויר. לאחר שתשחרר הבת מהמילואים היא קרוב לוודאי תעבור ללמוד בחו”ל. אז גם הוא יעזוב סוף סוף את ישראל

דוד אומר כי כבר למעלה מחמישים אלף ישראלים עזבו לאחרונה את ישראל. לדבריו מספר העוזבים צפוי אף לגדול לאור המשבר הגדול שישראל נמצאת בו, והוא צפוי להחריף. תשמע רוני הוא אמר לי נחרצות: ישראל היום נשלטת על ידי משפחת פשע הלוא היא משפחת נתניהו. הם עושים מה שהם רוצים, ובעלי התפקידים לצדו של נתניהו הם נוכלים וחסרי כישורים. נתניהו יצר פילוג בעם שאי אפשר לתקנו כך שאי אפשר לגשר בין “הביסיסטים” למתנגדיו של נתניהו

כשאמרתי לדוד כי הכיצד יכול ראש ממשלת ישראל להחזיק בן כלומניק בפלורידה (יאיר נתניהו) שאפילו לא עובד, והמדינה מממנת את שירותי הביטחון שלו שעולים הון ובתקופת מלחמה? דוד קטע את דברי בחריפות: רוני זה כסף קטן לעומת מיליארדי השקלים שנשדדים מקופת המדינה על ידי נתניהו וחבורתו, בין היתר לטובת החרדים שאפילו לא משרתים בצבא.ווהוא (נתניהו) עוד טס מטוס מפואר שעלה מיליארד שקל

לאחר השיחה עם דוד ישבתי וחשבתי לעצמי על ישראל ועתידה ובמחשבותי הצטיירה תמונה עגומה מאוד. אלו שחושבים שבקרוב יפרוץ תהליך שלום חדש בין ישראל למדינות ערב ובעיקר עם סעודיה, חיים בחלום. סעודיה הודיעה כבר מפורשות! שכל תהליך שלום עימה חייבה לכלול פתרון גם לפלסטינים – והוא הקמה מדינה עצמאית עבורם. הימים שישראל תעשה הסכמי שלום בדמות הסכמי אברהם, ללא פתרון הבעייה הפלסטינית עברו מן העולם

יש בישראל כיום שמהללים את נתניהו כביכול על הצלחותיו מול החמאס והחיזבאללה, בזמן שהם שכחו את הכשלונותיו הרבים, שהביאו למחדלי השבעה באוטובר. וכן ויתור על החטופים כדי שיוכל להמשיך ולשבת על כיסא המלך. מבחינתי זה כמו להגיד שלגודלה מאיר היו הצלחות רבות במלחמת יום כיפור מול המצרים והסורים, תוך התעלמות מאחריותה למחדל הנוראי של התקפות הפתע של צבאות האויב על ישראל

בכל מדינה מתוקנת ראש ממשלה היה מתפטר מיד לאחר מחדלי השבעה באוקטובר, ונעלם מהציבור לעולמים, אך כמובן עומד למשפט העם במסגרת ועדה חקירה ממלכתית. אך את נתניהו הנוכל נורמות ויושר אינן תכונות המאפיינות אותו למרות שהוא דורש זאת מאחרים

נתניהו אחראי להעברת מיליארדי דולרים לחמאס מקטאר, והוא אחראי לפגיעה קשה ברשות הפלסטינית. נתניהו חיזק אפוא את הקיצונים בפלסטינים (חמאס) והחליש את המתונים יותר (הרשות). נתניהו אחראי גם על עיבוי והוספת ההתנחלויות בשטחים הכבושים שרק מרחיקים את ישראל מפתרון הסכסוך הממושך עם עולם הערבי והשגת שלום

בתקופת שלטונו הארוכה בת שבעה עשרה השנים של נתניהו, ישראל נחלשה מבפנים בצורה משמעותית. המדינה הפכה למושחתת, יותר דתית משיחית, יותר קפיטליסטית והרבה פחות הומנית

?מדוע אינני חוזר לגור בישראל

אני גר בוונקובר כבר למעלה מתשעה עשרה וחצי שנים ואין לי שום תוכניות לחזור לישראל. הסיבות לכך רבות וברורות מבחינתי. ובעיקר: אינני מוכן לחזור אחורה למציאות כה מורכבת וקשה שכפי שליוותה אותי במרבית חיי בישראל

במלחמת ששת הימים הייתי בן שמונה ואני זוכר כיצד אימי הגיעה לבית הספר כדי לקחת אותי למקלט של סבא הסמוך לביתנו במרכז ירושלים

מייד לאחר המלחמה הסביר הפרופסור ישעיהו ליבוביץ’ כי כיבוש השטחים בעקבות המלחמה יהיה אסון מבחינת ישראל, ישחית את המדינה ואף יסכן את עתידה. אז עדיין לא הבנתי על מה הוא מדבר. אך כשאשר התבגרתי קלטתי עד כמה דבריו של פרופסור ליבוביץ’ היו ונשארו נכונים עד עצם היום הזה

במלחמת יום כיפור עת הייתי בן ארבע עשרה ההורים היו כרגיל בנסיעה בחו”ל. אחי ואני נשארנו בבית כאשר נשמענו להוראות להפעיל האפלה בשעות הערב. לאחר מספר ימים ההורים הצליחו למצוא טיסה ולחזור מארה”ב לישראל

במלחמת לבנון הראשונה נקראתי לצאת למילואים בלבנון. הייתי בסך הכל פקיד בפלוגת הנדסה, איך כיוון שהם נאלצו לצאת לשטח בלבנון גם אני הצטרפתי אליהם. אנו שרתנו באזור ציר מזבושה תחת אחריותו של המגד בני ברבש. אחרי כחודש מילואים השתחררתי הביתה

לאחר המלחמה נסעתי לטיול מהנה באירופה ומאז ננטע אצלי לראשונה הרצון לעבור ולגור בחו”ל. פשוט לממש חלום ולגור באחת ממדינות המערב

בין לבין חיינו בישראל פיגועים רבים שלצערי הפכו לשגרת חיים. מי שחי בישראל מכיר מלחמות, פיגועים והרבה הרבה ימים לא שקטים. כך היה וכך יהיה

בראשית שנות השמונים התחלתי להבין סוף סוף שאחזקת השטחים הכבושים לא מאפשרת לפלסטינים להקים מדינה עצמאית משלהם. ובמקביל מסכנת את ביטחונה של ישראל. כבר אז ראיתי שישראל מחולקת לשני מחנות ברורים: תומכי השלום והחזרת השטחים ותומכי החלום של ארץ ישראל השלמה שהאמינו שזה דווקא יגביר את הביטחון במדינה. אני כאמור נימנתי על מחנה השלום שלאורך השנים הלך והתכווץ לצערי. לעומתו מחנה של המתנחלים ותומכיהם הלך וגדל. אז התחלתי להרגיש פחות ופחות שייך לישראל

במלחמת המפרץ הראשונה כבר גרתי בתל אביב. לא אשכח לעולם את הלילה הנורא ההוא ביום חמישי בסביבות שתיים לפנות בוקר. צפיתי אז בחדשות בטלוויזיה שתיארו את מהלכי ארה”ב בעיראק ואז נשמעה הסיסמה “נחש צפע” ולאחריה הופעלה אזעקה. אז הופיעה השקופית “בשל התקפת טילים על ישראל הופעלה אזעקת אמת”. ואכן נפל טיל מעיראק בשכונת התקווה, שבקו אווירי קרובה הייתה לביתי במרכז תל אביב. שמעתי היטב את הדי הפיצוץ ונכנסתי ממש לחרדה נוראית. אז אמרתי לעצמי כי הכתובת היא על הקיר ויום אחד יגיעו הטילים האמיתיים מאיראן שהכוונה לטילים אטומיים. הבנתי אז שעלי לעזוב את ישראל ולצערי רק לאחר ארבעה עשרה שנים עשיתי זאת

תוך מספר דקות יצאת את ביתי ונסעתי בטירוף לביתו של חבר כדי שלא להיות לבד. למחרת החבר עזב את תל אביב ונסע למשפחו באילת. ואז החלטתי לנסוע לבית הורי בירושלים, ששם שההיתי בכל תקופת המלחמה. בכל פעם שנשמעה “האזעקה” ממש נכנסתי לחרדה בחרדה ושהייתי עם הורי בחדר האטום

לאחר רצח ראש הממשלה יצחק רבין באמצע שנות התשעים הרגשתי עוד יותר כמה אני לא יכול להשתייך עוד לישראל. אז גם החל לככב בנימין נתניהו האחראי לגל ההסתה נגד רבין. הפכתי לזר בה ועדיף להיות זר בחו”ל. לאחר עשר שנים עזבתי לוונקובר

Comedy can unite and heal

Comedian Erik Angel performs his one-man standup show, Speaking Falafel, at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver on Nov. 14. (photo from Erik Angel)

“This year, I discovered even more how comedy is an important tool to bring people together, for release and relief, and I won’t be exaggerating if I say that comedy saved me this year,” Erik Angel told the Independent in an interview in advance of his solo performance Nov. 14, 8 p.m., at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver. He’ll also be taking part in a show for students at the University of British Columbia while he’s here.

“This is perhaps the saddest time in my life, with a lot of pain, sorrow and worry, and going on stage night after night and making people laugh, helps me clear my mind and move on,” said Angel of the year since Oct. 7, 2023. “On stage, I deal with my reality today, with antisemitism, but I do it in an entertaining way. They say that comedy is tragedy plus time and I call my performance a humanitarian respite for the soul.”

Angel, who lives in New York, has opened for headliners like Maz Jobrani and Zarna Garg. He’s been part of several comedy festivals and has performed in more than a dozen countries to date. This will be his first time in Vancouver.

Born and raised in Israel, Angel moved to the United States for love, he said, after meeting his bashert at, of all places, the Jewish community centre in Krakow, Poland, in 2015.

“I went to Krakow for a long weekend and all my life changed completely,” he said.

Angel has worked in several creative fields. As a singer-songwriter, he released three albums in Israel. He studied drama and worked as an actor for five years. He did some standup comedy in Hebrew at open mics in Israel almost a decade ago, but said he quickly switched to doing routines in English, even while still in Israel.

“Since summer 2016,” he said, “I’ve been doing comedy in English, almost on a daily basis.”

The show that Angel is bringing to the Vancouver JCC next week is the product of a lot of work.

“Speaking Falafel is an hour of comedy that I worked on for seven long years of comedy spots, day after day, and I am very proud of it. It’s a very funny show about my journey since I went on this long weekend in Krakow and met the love of my life. I share the difficulties of becoming a new immigrant, newly married in my 40s, the differences between Israeli culture and other cultures in the world, how to be now ‘the Jew’ everywhere, to live 24/7 with a second language. I tell stories, I speak with the audience, and I even sing a little bit.”

The Nov. 14 show is a bonus for Vancouverites, as Angel’s main purpose for coming to the city is the UBC show, which is the start of a winter tour for Comedy for Peace.

Angel established Comedy for Peace five years ago.

“I grew up in Israel with two million Muslims. I never met one – not in school, not in my basketball team,” he said. “I started to meet Muslims when I started to travel the world. The meetings were always friendly, and I wanted to do something artistic together. When I moved to New York, I became part of the New York comedy scene. I produced the first show, that was a huge success, and since then we have had shows in more than 50 cities in the US and Canada.

“Comedy for Peace is not a political event,” he stressed. “It’s about different communities who sit together under one roof and have fun. Simple as it sounds, we want to show people how easy it is to collaborate, laugh, learn about each other and discover how much we are more alike than different. Today, we also have a version with Christian comedians that will travel with the West Coast tour. Nov. 9, Comedy for Peace will be part of the New York Comedy Festival for the second time.

“After Oct. 7, a few shows were canceled (and a few not) and very fast we decided that, for us now, it’s more important than ever and this is why we keep going,” added Angel. “There are comedians, mostly Muslim or Christian Arabs, that cut me off and don’t want to be a part of it – it’s painful because I didn’t change – but most of the comedians are still on board. And our goal now is to bring our message everywhere possible, and [I] will never give up and will always believe most of us, the people, just want to live together peacefully.”

Performing alongside Angel at UBC will be Liz Glazer, Gibran Saleem and Paul Schissler.

“From my experience, people that come to support the show support the idea and are not coming to protest or say something against it and I hope it will be the same this time,” said Angel when asked if he was concerned about the protests and vandalism that have taken place at UBC and other universities. “We are a non-political peace show, so it’s crazy for me to think that things will go differently. Until today, the only problem we have had to deal with was people calling/writing or trying to shame online our Muslim/Christian Arab comedians or asking them not to do it anymore. Most of them just want to do it more since then. But still, we have the reality, there are many haters out there and everything can happen. We have a Q&A session at the end and we are open to speaking with reasonable people that will come with an open heart and ask questions they want to speak about or to understand more. This is part of our mission, to be there together on stage.”

To watch some clips of Angel’s performances from around the world, visit his YouTube channel, youtube.com/@erikangelcomedy9702, or his Instagram page, instagram.com/erikangelcomedy/?hl=en. For tickets to Speaking Falafel, go to eventbrite.com.

Resolving Gaza dilemma

Israel needs to adopt a long-term objective in its response to Hamas’s attack of Oct. 7. Israel’s immediate objective is the defeat of Hamas. The question becomes what is to happen not only to Gaza but also to the West Bank when that happens.

For Israel simply to withdraw from Gaza would lead to a resuscitation of Hamas. For Israel to stay in Gaza would revive the problems which led to its withdrawal in 2005.

The recent negotiations around a ceasefire, release of the hostages, an Arab peacekeeping force and Israeli recognition of a Palestinian state, if accepted, would keep Hamas in power. The May 31 proposal of US President Joe Biden, which would keep Hamas in power in Gaza, is a non-starter. A ceasefire was already in place on Oct. 6, before the Hamas attack of Oct. 7. For Hamas, a new ceasefire would be a rearmament pause before its next attack on Israel. The Hamas leadership has said as much.

Simply putting the Palestinian Authority nominally in charge of Gaza leads to the same dead end. In the 2006 Palestinian elections, Hamas won. There have been no elections since then. With a new election, the result would likely be the same.

For peace negotiations to reach a plausible agreement, both an ideal result in mind and a strategy to reach that result must be in place. The ideal solution is well known – two states living side by side in peace with each other. The strategy should be directed to overcoming the widespread animosity among Palestinians to the existence of Israel and the resignation of Israelis to the reality of that animosity.

To want to live side by side in peace with each other, both populations must want peace. The continued terrorism against Israel and Israelis emanating not only from Gaza but also from the West Bank, as well as the Palestinian Authority’s failure to accept one Israeli peace plan after another, has made the Palestinian Authority not a credible peace plan partner and has generated radicalism within Israel opposing peace.

Among the Israeli residents of the West Bank, there are groups who engage in terrorism against Palestinians in pursuit of the integration of the West Bank into Israel. The government of Israel has been remiss in preventing this terrorism and remedying the consequences.

Current negotiations with Arab states may give the Palestinian Authority again a peace plan offer, this time, one they may accept. The suggestion that they would or even could implement a peace plan effectively is a lot harder to credit.

Instead, those Arab states currently proposed as contributors to a possible peacekeeping force after a ceasefire should agree, along with the Palestinian Authority, on something different. They should agree to deny Hamas’s propaganda, counter Hamas’s allies, and stand against Hamas’s physical and military survival. In areas of Gaza where Hamas has been defeated, the Israel Defence Forces would withdraw, to be replaced by Arab coalition forces, led by Egypt, as governing trustees. The same coalition, led by Jordan, would advise and assist the Palestinian Authority to act consistently in the West Bank with what the coalition is doing in Gaza. The United Nations General Assembly, if the proposed Arab coalition and the Palestinian Authority took the initiative, could authorize the UN Trusteeship Council to supervise the trusteeship over Gaza.

The proposed trusteeship would step into the shoes of the Palestinian Authority, with sole control over Area A outlined in the Oslo Accord, joint control with Israel in Area B and no control over Area C. The boundaries of the West Bank trusteeship, under this arrangement, could be shifted to take into account territorial swaps proposed in various peace negotiations.

To Israel, that sort of agreement would signal commitment by the Arab coalition to the defeat of Hamas and a lasting peace. From an Arab coalition perspective, Hamas’s defeat would mean victory over a common enemy, reining in terrorism based on distortions of Islam, a form of terrorism that has plagued the Arab world. From a Palestinian perspective, such an agreement could provide security for distribution of aid and medical supplies, which, despite the abundance of deliveries, has been to date difficult and dangerous.

Eradicating the terrorist threat completely is unrealistic even in the most peaceful of states. An Arab coalition Gaza trusteeship and a West Bank advice and assistance role would remain in effect until such time as Gaza and West Bank can form a functioning state; until the terrorism threat emanating from these territories is marginalized; and until Palestinians generally are ready to accept Israelis as their neighbours.

This Arab coalition trusteeship for Gaza and advice and assistance role for the West Bank may be lengthy, lasting even a generation. The education of children in Gaza and the West Bank has motivated many Palestinians to seek death through killing or trying to kill Jews in order to become religious martyrs who have earned afterlife redemption. That education must be undone.

Peace between Israel and a Palestinian state is an ideal. Realizing that ideal requires taking steps which address directly the causes of failure of all peace efforts to date.

David Matas is an international human rights lawyer based in Winnipeg and senior honorary counsel to B’nai Brith Canada. Noemi Gal-Or is a retired professor of international relations and an international law lawyer based in Vancouver.

Not such a great divide

Co-authors Raja G. Khouri, left, and Jeffrey J. Wilkinson in a conversation at Canadian Memorial United Church and Centre for Peace June 13. (photo by Pat Johnson)

To bridge a divide between peoples, Jews and Palestinians need to listen and understand one another’s stories of trauma, according to two authors who spoke in Vancouver June 13.

“Not only do we not know each other’s narrative, we don’t want to know each other’s narrative,” said Raja G. Khouri. “We are resistant to the other’s narrative. Palestinians need to understand Jewish suffering and Jews need to understand Palestinian suffering.”

Khouri, founding president of the Canadian Arab Institute, is a Palestinian-Canadian. With Jeffrey J. Wilkinson, a Jewish American who lives in Canada, he wrote The Wall Between: What Jews and Palestinians Don’t Want to Know About Each Other.

The two men have been engaged in ongoing dialogue around trauma and other topics related to Israel and Palestine. Their book was released four days before the Oct. 7 terror attacks.

Jewish trauma from the Holocaust and Palestinian trauma from the Nakba, or the “Catastrophe” of the 1948 war, replay in various ways among the peoples today, said Wilkinson, an educator who works on issues of trauma.

“It’s not about amount of loss,” said Wilkinson. “Six million Jews died, 750,000 Palestinians [were] displaced. That impact is not about the numbers. That impact is about that loss, that something being taken from you, that feeling of anger, resistance.”

The conversation, at Canadian Memorial United Church and Centre for Peace, was sponsored by Vancouver Friends of Standing Together, in partnership with several other organizations. Standing Together describes itself as “a progressive grassroots movement mobilizing Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel against the occupation and for peace, equality and social justice.”

The authors acknowledge the chasms between the consensus Israeli and Palestinian narratives, while carefully noting that they did not claim to speak on behalf of their respective peoples.

“Zionists are saying 1967, 1967, 1967,” said Wilkinson, referring to the war that marks the beginning of what many consider “the occupation.”

“Palestinians are saying 1948, 1948, 1948. The two-state solution does nothing to address 1948,” Wilkinson said.

A two-state solution is not something either author views as a reasonable proposition, said Wilkinson – unless it is as a waystation to an alternative that neither author spelled out explicitly.

“I’m not saying it’s a bad solution and you can’t support it,” Wilkinson said of the idea of two states. “But I want you to frame it from the perspective of justice, and it does not address the injustice of Palestinians.”

While the evening – and the book – were billed as a conversation across barriers, the divide was not as big as advertised. Both authors view the existence of Israel as a problem to be solved.

“I believe that Zionism and my Judaism are not compatible,” Wilkinson said. “That does not lessen my compassion for the vast majority of my community who are somewhere on that journey but not where I am, and I embrace you as you walk through that.”

Wilkinson explicitly denounced the extremist rhetoric heard in some anti-Israel protests, such as calls to destroy Tel Aviv and telling Jews to “go back to Poland.”

Khouri said Palestinians believe that “the antisemitism label” has been misused to silence them.

“We both know that antisemitism is real and it’s dangerous,” he said. “But, to Palestinians, it is a weapon that has been used to silence criticism, or at least that’s what we believe. And it’s important to get that.”

Both men believe there is a misunderstanding around definitions of terms.

Israelis and their allies might hear the word “apartheid” and reject it.

“Lens the word from the person who is speaking,” Wilkinson advised, outlining how he views separate treatment of Palestinians as equivalent to the racist regime of 20th-century South Africa.

“Likewise with terms like genocide,” said Khouri. “We both avoided using the term for the longest time. But I can tell you there isn’t a Palestinian I know who isn’t convinced that this is absolute genocide because of the mass killing that is happening. Whether it meets the legal definition of genocide or not, it feels very much like genocide.”

The defensiveness that comes around these terms, they said, is a barrier to the peoples’ understanding of each other.

The flexibility of definitions extends to the term “intifada.”

“When you hear someone, say, we’re calling for intifada, ask them what they mean by this,” said Khouri. “Do you mean going and blowing up cafés and buses?”

Neither author offered their interpretation of the term.

The Oct. 7 attacks took place in a particular context, they said.

“If you fixate on Oct. 7 only, then you’re missing a big part of the picture,” said Khouri.

“That doesn’t mean you grieve less for the victims of Oct. 7,” Wilkinson said. “It doesn’t mean that.”

Avril Orloff, representing Vancouver Friends of Standing Together, emceed the event. Rabbi Laura Duhan Kaplan, director of inter-religious studies and professor of Jewish studies at the Vancouver School of Theology provided a land acknowledgment and contextualized the discussion in the context of Shavuot, which was ending as the event began.

Srulik, meet Handala

The ways in which the characters of Srulik, left, and Handala epitomize the historical and cultural narrative of the Israelis and Palestinians, respectively, imbue these cartoons with an impact stronger than words. (photo by Gil Zohar)

Driving east from Jerusalem on the winding Jordanian-built road that once led down from the Mount of Olives to the Dead Sea, one passes through a series of picturesque Arab suburbs and soon comes to a dead end in front of the grotesque West Bank barrier.

Called Geder ha-Hafrada (separation fence) in Hebrew and jidar al-fasl al-’unsuri (apartheid wall) in Arabic, the insurmountable (if still incomplete) eight-metre-high concrete barrier has no doubt contributed to a reduction in terrorism and car theft. However, my objection to it is more existential: like some of those in West Berlin who spray-painted their protest for freedom on the Bundesrepublik side of die Mauer even as armed GDR guards used deadly force to prevent anyone from approaching the wall’s eastern side, I believe all walls must fall.

It is a metaphor that has repeated itself from Joshua’s encircling of Jericho, to the Berlin Wall and its remaining East Side Gallery, to Garth Hewitt’s ballad “They’ve Canceled Christmas in Bethlehem,” about the stranglehold the wall has placed on both day-to-day life and religious pilgrimage in the place where Jesus, “the Prince of Peace,” was born 2,000-plus years ago.

The world today is caught between two conflicting ideologies: some democratic countries joining in unions with open borders, joint legal systems and a common currency, of which the European Union – notwithstanding its problems – is a great success. Then, there are other countries – many repressive and undemocratic – defending their borders with minefields and walls. Like John Lennon, I prefer the first vision – of a growing global union without barriers. Imagine that.

Thus, armed with the tools of the graffiti artist – an X-ACTO knife, cardboard stencil and spray paint – I recently made my way to Abu Dis with my friend Hajj Ibrahim Abu el-Hawa, my daughter Bareket and fellow artist Eva Feld to make our mark. Reasoning that a picture is worth a thousand words, we chose a symbolic image whose meaning is unequivocal.

The image we created depicts Handala raising hands with Srulik (see picture). The two iconic cartoon characters are respectively well known by Palestinians and Israelis – yet, each is equally unknown by the other. It is a symmetry of ignorance of the other’s narrative that will have to be overcome before true peace can be achieved.

Allow me to explain the mirror meanings of the twin caricatures.

Handala – an omnipresent image on T-shirts and key chains in the aswaq (plural of suq, market) of Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza Strip – was created by Naji al-’Ali in 1969. A 10-year-old child driven in 1948 from his Galilee village of ash-Shajara (14 kilometres from Tiberias) to the ‘Ain al-Hilweh refugee camp in Lebanon, al-’Ali went on to become the leading political cartoonist in the Arab world.

Before being assassinated in London in 1987, he produced more than 40,000 bitingly sarcastic cartoons lampooning Arab leaders and lamenting the stateless status of his people. His autobiographical image of Handala – a barefoot, faceless, refugee youth – remains a potent symbol of the struggle of the Palestinian people for justice and self-determination.

Al-’Ali wrote: “Handala is my signature. I gave birth to this child in the [Persian] Gulf. He was born 10 years old, and he will always be 10. At that age, I left my homeland and, when he returns, Handala will still be 10, and then he will start growing up. The laws of nature do not apply to him. He is unique. Things will become normal again when the homeland returns.”

Impish Srulik – a diminutive of Yisrael (Israel) – carries an equally rich symbolism in depicting nascent Israel and, in particular, its native-born Sabras. The illustrated character was first drawn in 1956 by the cartoonist Kariel Gardosh, better known by his nom de plume, Dosh. The Hungarian-born Holocaust survivor drew Srulik for decades in the pages of the daily Maariv, until his death in 2000.

Dosh generally depicted Srulik as a young man wearing a kova tembel hat, “biblical sandals” and khaki shorts. He drew him as a pioneering Zionist and lover of the land of Israel, a dedicated farmer who in time of need dons an Israel Defence Forces uniform and goes out to defend the state of Israel, equipped with an Uzi machine gun. In contrast to the antisemitic stereotype of the weak or cunning Jew, which appeared in the Nazi weekly Der Stürmer and other European and Arab newspapers and journals, Dosh’s Srulik was a proud, strong and sympathetic Jewish character.

Shalom Rosenfeld, editor of Maariv from 1974 to 1980, wrote: “Srulik became not only a mark of recognition of [Dosh’s] amazing daily cartoons, but an entity standing on its own, as a symbol of the land of Israel – beautiful, lively, innocent … and having a little chutzpah and, naturally, also of the new Jew.”

Introducing Srulik to Palestinians and Handala to Israelis is not a bad way to begin to redress each side’s ignorance of the other’s narrative. The ways in which they epitomize the historical and cultural narrative of their own people imbue these cartoons with an impact stronger than words.

When a peace treaty is ultimately implemented between Israel and Palestine (as I’m sure it must), perhaps the image of Handala and Srulik holding hands could be adopted as a neutral symbol of coexistence and nonviolence. Their creators, Naji al-’Ali and Kariel Gardosh, both knew firsthand of persecution and exile, and the iconic figures they bequeathed us share the hope of living in freedom and peace. When peace finally arrives, new and emotionally satisfying images and symbols will need to be created to bridge the chasm between Jews and Arabs in our broken Promised Land.

Gil Zohar is a writer and tour guide in Jerusalem.

Thought-provoking speakers

Dr. Gil Murciano of Mitvim, the Israeli Institute for Regional Foreign Policies, and Uri Weltmann of Standing Together, spoke April 17 at Temple Sholom. (photo by Pat Johnson)

For months, weekly rallies across Israel after Shabbat have demanded the return of the hostages from Gaza. These rallies have often coincided with separate protests, which have been going on much longer, against the government of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu generally and its proposed judicial reforms specifically. These two streams of protesters have coalesced in recent weeks, according to an Israeli activist leader who spoke in Vancouver last week, because, he said, many Israelis are convinced that Netanyahu is not advancing freedom for the hostages, but hindering it, for his own political advantage.

Uri Weltmann, field organizer of Standing Together, made the claim April 17 during an event at Temple Sholom organized by New Israel Fund Canada.

“What happened three weeks ago is that it stopped being two different protest movements,” said Weltmann. “They are basically changing their strategy. They are calling for early elections and for [Netanyahu’s] government to be removed and replaced with a different government. [Activists are] pointing their finger at him as the obstruction, as the obstacle toward advancing to a ceasefire agreement.”

Weltmann argues that Netanyahu is concerned not only for his political survival, but for his freedom.

“For Netanyahu, the protraction of this war, the continuation of this war, is in his political interest,” said Weltmann. “He knows that a temporary ceasefire might lead to a permanent ceasefire. A permanent ceasefire would mean an end to the war. An end to this war would bring an end to this coalition government because the extremists he huddled with have already said publicly that, if they will end the war before total victory, they will topple the government.”

The end of the current government and the ousting of Netanyahu, he said, would have more than just political ramifications for the prime minister, who opinion polls suggest would be soundly routed if an election were held now.

“New elections mean him losing the majority and him losing the majority is not only Netanyahu the politician being ousted from office. It’s also Netanyahu facing corruption charges, having his trial resume, [and he] might lose his personal liberty. For him, it’s intimately linked to the continuation of the war.”

The consensus among these activists is that Netanyahu is seeking to prolong the war and the captivity of the hostages to protect his political and personal interests, said Weltmann.

“It’s an incredibly important political development within Israel that a broad movement around the families and friends of the hostages have made this link,” he said.

Weltmann’s group, Standing Together (known in Hebrew and Arabic as Omdim Beyachad-Naqif Ma’an), was founded in 2015 and is one of the on-the-ground groups New Israel Fund supports.

Among the goals of the group is to build a grassroots movement for peace and progressive politics in Israel, including in rural and peripheral areas of the country. Making such a movement successful beyond the activist hub in Tel Aviv is the only way to advance Standing Together’s goals, Weltmann said. Even a more centrist or progressive government, if elected tomorrow, would not necessarily advance meaningful steps to peace and coexistence if there is not a broad popular movement in support of such a policy shift, he said.

Without a national movement for peace, he said, a new prime minister, however well-intentioned, would not feel the pressure to abandon the status quo and take steps for a changed future.

“We must, as a strategic starting point in our process of progressive transformation of Israeli society, be present in the Negev, be present in the Galilee, be present in those parts of Israeli society that for too long have been the playing ground of the right-wing with left-wing actors completely non-present,” he said. “We must be there organizing local communities.”

Jewish citizens cannot do it by themselves, said Weltmann, and neither can Arab citizens.

“We must have Jewish-Palestinian unity and cooperation within Israel for this change to be effective,” he said. An example of this strategy was a slogan adopted by a joint Jewish-Arab slate in Haifa during the recent municipal elections. The far-right Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power) party of Itamar Ben-Gvir ran slates across the country trying to solidify the party’s roots at the civic level. The joint slate in Haifa played off Otzma Yehudit’s xenophobia with the slogan “Jewish Arab Power.”

“We are at a crossroads,” said Weltmann. “Every Israeli should choose which side am I on: the side that leads to a continuation of the status quo, a continuation of the state of affairs in which the Palestinians live in the occupied territories under military rule devoid of citizenship, devoid of rights, a situation that can lead to Oct. 7 one after another unless we put an end to it, or the reality of an Israeli-Palestinian peace that will guarantee both people safety, security and an imaginable, livable future?”

Weltmann spoke alongside Dr. Gil Murciano, an Iran expert and chief executive officer of the think-tank Mitvim, the Israeli Institute for Regional Foreign Policies, which one journalist has called “the diplomatic wing of the protest movement.”

Like Weltmann, Murciano longs for a “new majority” in Israel’s body politic. “A new majority that will allow us to advance toward a state where we live in peace, we live in dignity, we live in equality, without the occupation, without the injustices, throughout our society,” he said.

A fundamental shift in perspective is needed, argued Murciano.

“We used to speak about ‘wars of no choice’ in Israel,” he said. “We need to start thinking in terms of ‘peace of no choice.’”

On the one side, he said, the extreme right has a plan of annexation, with Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s minister of finance and head of the far-right National Religious Party, calling for the government to “encourage” migration from Gaza to Egypt. On the other side, he said, since Oct. 7, people on the left have been motivated to seek an alternative to the status quo.

Dr. Maayan Kreitzman, a local food systems researcher and activist who moderated the event, challenged Murciano on this point. Rather than progressive voices calling for more coexistence, she said, she has heard the opposite. People that are “quite dovish” have had second thoughts about their worldview and transformed into a more hawkish, securitized attitude, she suggested.

Murciano acknowledged that all Israelis share one overriding priority. “For Israelis, it’s pretty clear,” he said. “The first, second and third priority of Israelis right now is security.”

That is a prerequisite to any advancement, he said.

Murciano proposes something he acknowledges to be “a little bit symbolic,” an international peace conference to kick off a new process between moderate Israelis and moderate Palestinians. This could be a first step to breaking an impasse that has existed in recent years, he said.

“Some people have described the last decade as the lost decade of Israeli diplomacy,” he said, a period where “conflict management” has been the priority; effectively, a maintenance of the status quo.

“I think that’s the right description, actually. It’s a strategy of not having a strategy,” said Murciano. “Coming to terms with the fact that there is no political way out and basically every couple of years we’re going to have a bit of violence.”

This approach sees Israelis forfeiting the initiative to Hezbollah and Hamas, he said, “Basically setting yourself in a situation where you only respond to a reality that is forced upon you.”

Oct. 7, he said, destroyed this conceptual framing.

Part of any future needs to include a multilateral project to “rebuild life-sustaining systems” in Gaza, he said, not a “peace-keeping force” but a “multinational force” that will be an on-the-ground part of a larger process toward peace and coexistence.

Ben Murane, executive director of New Israel Fund Canada, spoke of the emotional impacts of recent months.

“If you’re like me, what has been excruciating the past six months has been not just holding my pain, our Jewish pain, the pain of my Israeli coworkers, my family, my friends there, the pain of the Israeli people, but also, in my heart, holding the pain of the Palestinian people too,” he said.

Since the earliest days of the current war, Murane said, there have been countless glimmers of hope in the form of cross-cultural dialogue.

“In the first few months, we were astounded to see, across Israel, dozens of gatherings, conferences, events with hundreds of Jews and Palestinians standing together holding up those now-iconic purple signs saying ‘Jews and Arabs refuse to be enemies,’ ‘Jews and Arabs stand together’ or just simply ‘B’Yachad,’ together,” said Murane. “We were astounded to see Jewish citizens of Israel respond to the needs of the Palestinian citizens of Israel, Palestinian citizens of Israel making calls to families of the hostages, joint Jewish-Arab humanitarian aid missions to the south and to the north. As the war in Gaza accelerated, those Israeli voices also said, ‘We do have choices, even now. We have lots of choices with how we execute a just war justly.’”

Any long-term solution to the decades-long conflict must bring safety and dignity to both peoples, said Murane, “and anything else, anything short of fairness to both sides, will perpetuate this for another generation.”

New Israel Fund partners with and supports, according to its website, “organizations in Israel that fight for socioeconomic equality, religious freedom, civil and human rights, shared society and anti-racism, Palestinian citizens, and democracy itself.”

The April 17 event was hosted by Temple Sholom and co-sponsored by JSpaceCanada, which calls itself the advocacy voice of Liberal Zionism, Ameinu Canada, described as the voice of labour Zionism in Canada, and Canadian Friends of Peace Now, as well as the speakers’ organizations.

Rabbi Dan Moskovitz, senior rabbi at Temple Sholom, said he had received emails expressing concerns about hosting a perceived left-wing event.

“I get the same emails when we host people to the right of centre,” he said.

One of the purposes of a synagogue, he said, is to engage with ideas that “comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.

“You may find your truth by agreeing with what you here tonight,” he said. “You may find your truth by disagreeing with what you hear tonight. The important part is to engage with it.”

Vancouver activist David Berson promoted the opportunity to listen to the Israeli guests as a chance to gain a perspective apart from the most common refrain he hears on social media and WhatsApp threads.

“There’s another way you can look at what’s going on,” he told the Independent after the event. “Come out and hear a different perspective. I invited people to come tonight and listen to a different narrative.”

The 200 to 300 people at the event was about double what organizers had earlier expected, he said.

A time for miracles

Hanukkah is a reminder that darkness can be transformed into light, and that miracles are possible.

With so much conflict, misery, anxiety and hopelessness in the world, we need some miracles.

There have been a few rays of hope in Israel in recent days – the release of hostages from Gaza has brought a world of relief to the families and friends of those freed and to Jews and others abroad. As a people, we will not rest until all those who have been kidnapped are returned home safely.

Even then, the war will likely continue, with the stated goal of eradicating Hamas. As catastrophic and heartbreaking as the war and the atrocities that sparked it have been, this is a single battle in a longer conflict that seems destined to go on, at least for the time being.

When we look at today’s events in the context of a larger history, it is understandable to conclude that things are not getting better, but worse. Silver linings in such a situation seem few and far between. To be honest, in this space we try to find something constructive and hopeful in every topic we confront, and it has rarely been more difficult than in the past two months.

As students of history, we can only offer this piece of hope: many times, in our individual lives, in the story of the world and in the 3,500 years of history of the Jewish people, seemingly intractable problems have been resolved in stunning and unexpected ways.

Consider three massive geopolitical examples that have happened in the living memory of most of us.

Many of us grew up under the shadow of nuclear catastrophe. Some of us may recall practising hiding under our desks in preparation for a nuclear explosion. All of us who are middle-aged or older certainly remember a world viewed as a binary of “us” (the capitalist West) and “them” (the communist East).

From the perspective of the child cowering under the desk, the idea that the defining global status quo would end not in a bang – the ultimate bang – but with the relatively peaceful dismantling of the Soviet Union and its client regimes, would have seemed unimaginable. The Cold War, which defined our worldview and, at times, threatened our very existence, ended peacefully more than 30 years ago. Just a short time before it did, nobody could have foreseen the unfolding of events.

Likewise, the end of the racist regime in South Africa and its apartheid institutions. One of the most venal systems ever imagined was ended not by bloody revolution, but by a relatively peaceful, collaborative transition to democratic majority rule.

A third example, the Irish conflict, understatedly referred to as the “Troubles,” largely ended with the successes of the Good Friday accords of 1998.

In all three of these instances, the resolution of what seemed like intractable, even existential, challenges were overcome with remarkably sudden and unanticipated events.

It should be noted as well that, in all three cases, events played out very much because of specific leaders who were involved, who took immense risks, were willing to compromise, and placed an immense amount of hope in the goodwill of their people to make their societies and, by extension, the world a better place.

We might say that we don’t see great figures on the horizon on either side of the conflict that presently consumes us with such intensity. But this is precisely the point. Vast historic changes have happened when least expected because movements and visionary individuals emerged and ushered in changes, upending the seemingly rigid status quo.

The Israeli leadership has promised that the current war will eliminate the terrorist autocrats who have run Gaza. The leadership in the West Bank is inevitably going to change before long as well, if only because the current president is aged 88.

Not incidentally, when this horrible war finally ends, Israelis will be undertaking a very serious review of recent events. It is entirely reasonable to expect significant changes at the top of both Israeli and Palestinian power structures in the very near future.

The truth is, in change there is hope. And, indeed, change is the only thing that is inevitable.

It might be also time to dig up an old chestnut from David Ben-Gurion, who said something that is relevant here not only because of the time of year – Hanukkah – but because of the time of history.

“In Israel, in order to be a realist, you must believe in miracles.”