making friends with the enemy is the
most revolutionary act in the world they
can change your life it has changed my
life I am German Palestinian and the
daughter of a Palestinian refugee my
family fled from Palestine in 1948
during the first arab-israeli war what
we Palestinians called an aqua the
catastrophe like many Palestinian
refugees they ended up in Lebanon
heavily traumatized by war violence and
by the loss of family members and I grew
up with this trauma and with the
conflict as my background I didn’t grow
up in the conflict because I was in
Germany but the conflict nevertheless
has shaped my life you know whenever I
visited my family in Lebanon we talked
about the conflict and we talked about
the pain and one day in 2011 we took
this trip to the Lebanese Israeli border
that’s me and a tiny part of my huge
lovely Palestinian family and you know
the border between Lebanon and Israel is
basically just a huge fence and it’s
protected on the Lebanese side by UN
soldiers every 200 meters and on the
Israeli side you have Israeli soldiers
and
Israeli tanks every 200 meters and when
you get too close to the border you get
shot immediately that is the situation
and when you stand there between Lebanon
and Israel you get this eerie feeling
you can feel the conflict you can feel
the tension you can almost touch it as I
was standing there with my family
looking over this fence and seeing
Israel for the first time
my life I can’t even describe how we had
that felt it was like I was I was like
feeling homesick for this place where my
grandparents came from but I I also
realized that I honestly had no idea
about Israelis I had never met an
Israeli before I had never talked to an
Israeli and I had no clue about how they
felt about the conflict how they felt
about peace how they felt about people
like me
German Palestinian so at some point at
some point I I got this urge and I
wanted actually I just wanted to climb
over the fence and walk into Israel and
find some Israelis to talk to because I
felt that I could not understand the
conflict without knowing Israelis but
you know you can’t because you get
trapped so fast forward one year later
in March 2012 I came across a facebook
page that said Israel loves Iran it was
a project by an Israeli graphic designer
Roni Adri who put up this poster on
Facebook together with a message to the
Iranian people to Israel’s ultimate
enemy because he too felt that he did
not know his enemy and he wanted to
change that so the message to this
picture said Iranians I’m supposed to
hate you I’m supposed to be afraid of
you and I don’t even know you and I
certainly don’t want to bump you long
story short this picture and a message
went viral and he got a lot of responses
back mostly from people from all over
the world but a lot of responses from
Iranians and from Syrians and from
Lebanese and from Egyptians and from
Palestinians and from Moroccans and from
people from all over the Middle East who
all asked themselves
who is this guy and what is he doing and
suddenly this page Israel of Iran became
a meeting place for people from all over
the Middle East and all those people
began to talk and to understand the
impact is you you get to understand
probably you can’t understand how big
this wall in the mines is but people in
the Middle East usually do not talk to
their neighbors Arabs don’t talk to
Israelis usually Iranians usually do not
talk to Israelis and Israelis usually
don’t talk to any of their neighbors
because it’s the enemy and you don’t
talk to your enemy it’s like a taboo but
on Israel of Iran people were sharing
their stories and they were like
communicating and that was incredibly
moving to watch I saw this page when it
was just a few days old and I did what
any reasonable person in my situation
would do I cried and then I it’s
something that was very much out of
character for me I contacted a stranger
on Facebook I didn’t know I didn’t know
what to expect when I first wrote my
message to Ronnie and his wife actually
I just wanted to learn more about the
project because I was interested but
before I knew it we had this intense
conversation and we went on skype and we
talked some more and we told each other
our stories and we told each other about
all families and we told each other
about you know the way we see the world
and we found out how much we had in
common and we became really good friends
and together we decided let’s push this
movement forward so we we had this page
Israel of Iran that Ronnie created and
then Iranian founded the Facebook page
Iran loves Israel as a response and two
Israelis had the idea of creating Israel
or Palestine so you know I created
palace
loves Israel on Facebook and yeah that’s
that’s suddenly it was a movement and we
called it the peace factory and we
thought about what do we want to make
with this momentum and we decided we
want to we want to build bridges between
between all those countries we want to
build bridges between those conflict
zones and our mission is to to actually
bring people together who would
otherwise not talk to each other
so we begin by matching them on Facebook
and we call it like you know it’s a
campaign and it’s called friend me for
peace
so we began by matching people from
different sides of this conflict like
Palestinians and Israelis or Iranians
and Israelis or you know at some point
we were like Americans and Iraqis Syrian
refugees and Germans you name it and we
had hundreds of these people matched on
Facebook and they were like that’s
amazing I’m gonna send you my picture
please find me some person I’m Israeli I
want to make a friend in Gaza or I’m
Lebanese please I want some Israeli
girlfriend so we did that and sometimes
people even met in real life and they
sent us the pictures of these meetings
and you know I mean it works because
when you when you make this connection
with someone from the other side with
someone who is considered to be your
enemy you begin to change and we wanted
to bring this this online experience
into the real world and we began by
creating workshops where we put people
from conflict zones together in one room
and have them talk but not on you know a
debate we began by storytelling and we
help them tell each other their stories
tell each other about their their inner
feelings and that brought change because
to me is really visible in the faces of
people when when when two people open up
to each other on a personal level and
come together and talk and tell their
stories you can see it in their faces
how much they change how much how much
you know their perception changes
because the thing is every conflict is
based on just two ingredients
dehumanization and victimization
dehumanization means that you stop
seeing the other side as humans and as
individuals and instead you perceive
them as a faceless mass and its mass is
a threat and victimization means that
you blame the other side for everything
that goes wrong and you perceive
yourself in your side as the only victim
you get the idea when both sides do it
you get is really a complicated
unsolvable conflict but the remedy is
easy it’s just two Ryu Minh eyes the
people in conflict zones and we do it by
showing their faces and sharing their
stories and by helping them to form this
personal bond and you know I’m not gonna
lie to you it’s not all fun and games
sometimes it’s incredibly difficult
sometimes it’s incredibly frustrating
because you know we’re working in a
field that is emotionally loaded with
trauma and it’s hard to get through and
we work against decades and centuries of
prejudices of racism of brainwashing and
of ongoing violence on both sides and
it’s hard to get through and sometimes
it doesn’t work but when it works it’s
like it’s like the light goes on maybe
the most emotional and difficult time in
the history of the peace Factory was the
summer of 2014 when the war between
Israel and Gaza took place
there was this young guy from Gaza he
was 19 years old
his name was Islam and he wrote a
comment on the page Palestine loves
Israel which was a courageous thing to
do while his whole neighborhood was
being bombed and what he wanted to know
was why why are they the Israelis doing
this to us and you got to know he had
never left Gaza and he had never met an
Israeli and everything that he knew
about Israelis was bombs and destruction
so naturally he asked himself are they
even human within one hour
he got fifty friend requests from
Israelis and the responses got on his
comment we’re incredible and blew his
mind and my too because many of those
Israelis answered that they too were
scared that they too had prejudices
against Palestinians especially against
those in Gaza and they answered him we
don’t want this war either we don’t we
don’t feel well with the situation we
are afraid as well but what actually
blew his mind was the couple of Israelis
who who told him we are so sorry for
your losses we are so sorry for your
pain we are so sorry for your suffering
and that was what what brought a
complete and what actually shattered his
mind and it was the other way around as
well because for all those Israelis it
was the first time that they talked to
someone from Gaza
so actually what happened was he became
a peace activist and he told all his
family and his friends and you know and
he created this movement in the Gaza
Strip in the middle of war peace is not
something that happens when a war ends
peace happens between people peace is a
state of mind
and once you make this direct connection
with your enemy with someone from the
other side you you begin to realize you
begin to see them as individuals you
stop seeing sides you see people and
that is what what brings the change and
I’m not naive I know we cannot solve
this conflict just by sharing a heart
and then it’s it you know and the bad
news is we cannot change the world but
the good news is we can change our world
and we can change the world of those
around us we all can go out today and
friend a stranger we can go out today
and smile at a stranger we can we can go
out today and make a disturber
connection to someone from the other
side we live in a world where we are
constantly being told that we have to be
afraid of the other that we have to be
afraid of those who flee from war that
there’s some enemy out there and it’s
frustrating but the good news is peace
is in our hands and peace is what we can
create every day in our own communities
in our schools and our families and all
imagine every Palestinian had one friend
in Israel imagine every Israeli had just
one friend in Iran or in Palestine every
American had just one friend in
Afghanistan or Iraq imagine every German
had one friend in Nigeria or Syria can
you imagine the impact thank you very
much
[Applause] [Music]
most revolutionary act in the world they
can change your life it has changed my
life I am German Palestinian and the
daughter of a Palestinian refugee my
family fled from Palestine in 1948
during the first arab-israeli war what
we Palestinians called an aqua the
catastrophe like many Palestinian
refugees they ended up in Lebanon
heavily traumatized by war violence and
by the loss of family members and I grew
up with this trauma and with the
conflict as my background I didn’t grow
up in the conflict because I was in
Germany but the conflict nevertheless
has shaped my life you know whenever I
visited my family in Lebanon we talked
about the conflict and we talked about
the pain and one day in 2011 we took
this trip to the Lebanese Israeli border
that’s me and a tiny part of my huge
lovely Palestinian family and you know
the border between Lebanon and Israel is
basically just a huge fence and it’s
protected on the Lebanese side by UN
soldiers every 200 meters and on the
Israeli side you have Israeli soldiers
and
Israeli tanks every 200 meters and when
you get too close to the border you get
shot immediately that is the situation
and when you stand there between Lebanon
and Israel you get this eerie feeling
you can feel the conflict you can feel
the tension you can almost touch it as I
was standing there with my family
looking over this fence and seeing
Israel for the first time
my life I can’t even describe how we had
that felt it was like I was I was like
feeling homesick for this place where my
grandparents came from but I I also
realized that I honestly had no idea
about Israelis I had never met an
Israeli before I had never talked to an
Israeli and I had no clue about how they
felt about the conflict how they felt
about peace how they felt about people
like me
German Palestinian so at some point at
some point I I got this urge and I
wanted actually I just wanted to climb
over the fence and walk into Israel and
find some Israelis to talk to because I
felt that I could not understand the
conflict without knowing Israelis but
you know you can’t because you get
trapped so fast forward one year later
in March 2012 I came across a facebook
page that said Israel loves Iran it was
a project by an Israeli graphic designer
Roni Adri who put up this poster on
Facebook together with a message to the
Iranian people to Israel’s ultimate
enemy because he too felt that he did
not know his enemy and he wanted to
change that so the message to this
picture said Iranians I’m supposed to
hate you I’m supposed to be afraid of
you and I don’t even know you and I
certainly don’t want to bump you long
story short this picture and a message
went viral and he got a lot of responses
back mostly from people from all over
the world but a lot of responses from
Iranians and from Syrians and from
Lebanese and from Egyptians and from
Palestinians and from Moroccans and from
people from all over the Middle East who
all asked themselves
who is this guy and what is he doing and
suddenly this page Israel of Iran became
a meeting place for people from all over
the Middle East and all those people
began to talk and to understand the
impact is you you get to understand
probably you can’t understand how big
this wall in the mines is but people in
the Middle East usually do not talk to
their neighbors Arabs don’t talk to
Israelis usually Iranians usually do not
talk to Israelis and Israelis usually
don’t talk to any of their neighbors
because it’s the enemy and you don’t
talk to your enemy it’s like a taboo but
on Israel of Iran people were sharing
their stories and they were like
communicating and that was incredibly
moving to watch I saw this page when it
was just a few days old and I did what
any reasonable person in my situation
would do I cried and then I it’s
something that was very much out of
character for me I contacted a stranger
on Facebook I didn’t know I didn’t know
what to expect when I first wrote my
message to Ronnie and his wife actually
I just wanted to learn more about the
project because I was interested but
before I knew it we had this intense
conversation and we went on skype and we
talked some more and we told each other
our stories and we told each other about
all families and we told each other
about you know the way we see the world
and we found out how much we had in
common and we became really good friends
and together we decided let’s push this
movement forward so we we had this page
Israel of Iran that Ronnie created and
then Iranian founded the Facebook page
Iran loves Israel as a response and two
Israelis had the idea of creating Israel
or Palestine so you know I created
palace
loves Israel on Facebook and yeah that’s
that’s suddenly it was a movement and we
called it the peace factory and we
thought about what do we want to make
with this momentum and we decided we
want to we want to build bridges between
between all those countries we want to
build bridges between those conflict
zones and our mission is to to actually
bring people together who would
otherwise not talk to each other
so we begin by matching them on Facebook
and we call it like you know it’s a
campaign and it’s called friend me for
peace
so we began by matching people from
different sides of this conflict like
Palestinians and Israelis or Iranians
and Israelis or you know at some point
we were like Americans and Iraqis Syrian
refugees and Germans you name it and we
had hundreds of these people matched on
Facebook and they were like that’s
amazing I’m gonna send you my picture
please find me some person I’m Israeli I
want to make a friend in Gaza or I’m
Lebanese please I want some Israeli
girlfriend so we did that and sometimes
people even met in real life and they
sent us the pictures of these meetings
and you know I mean it works because
when you when you make this connection
with someone from the other side with
someone who is considered to be your
enemy you begin to change and we wanted
to bring this this online experience
into the real world and we began by
creating workshops where we put people
from conflict zones together in one room
and have them talk but not on you know a
debate we began by storytelling and we
help them tell each other their stories
tell each other about their their inner
feelings and that brought change because
to me is really visible in the faces of
people when when when two people open up
to each other on a personal level and
come together and talk and tell their
stories you can see it in their faces
how much they change how much how much
you know their perception changes
because the thing is every conflict is
based on just two ingredients
dehumanization and victimization
dehumanization means that you stop
seeing the other side as humans and as
individuals and instead you perceive
them as a faceless mass and its mass is
a threat and victimization means that
you blame the other side for everything
that goes wrong and you perceive
yourself in your side as the only victim
you get the idea when both sides do it
you get is really a complicated
unsolvable conflict but the remedy is
easy it’s just two Ryu Minh eyes the
people in conflict zones and we do it by
showing their faces and sharing their
stories and by helping them to form this
personal bond and you know I’m not gonna
lie to you it’s not all fun and games
sometimes it’s incredibly difficult
sometimes it’s incredibly frustrating
because you know we’re working in a
field that is emotionally loaded with
trauma and it’s hard to get through and
we work against decades and centuries of
prejudices of racism of brainwashing and
of ongoing violence on both sides and
it’s hard to get through and sometimes
it doesn’t work but when it works it’s
like it’s like the light goes on maybe
the most emotional and difficult time in
the history of the peace Factory was the
summer of 2014 when the war between
Israel and Gaza took place
there was this young guy from Gaza he
was 19 years old
his name was Islam and he wrote a
comment on the page Palestine loves
Israel which was a courageous thing to
do while his whole neighborhood was
being bombed and what he wanted to know
was why why are they the Israelis doing
this to us and you got to know he had
never left Gaza and he had never met an
Israeli and everything that he knew
about Israelis was bombs and destruction
so naturally he asked himself are they
even human within one hour
he got fifty friend requests from
Israelis and the responses got on his
comment we’re incredible and blew his
mind and my too because many of those
Israelis answered that they too were
scared that they too had prejudices
against Palestinians especially against
those in Gaza and they answered him we
don’t want this war either we don’t we
don’t feel well with the situation we
are afraid as well but what actually
blew his mind was the couple of Israelis
who who told him we are so sorry for
your losses we are so sorry for your
pain we are so sorry for your suffering
and that was what what brought a
complete and what actually shattered his
mind and it was the other way around as
well because for all those Israelis it
was the first time that they talked to
someone from Gaza
so actually what happened was he became
a peace activist and he told all his
family and his friends and you know and
he created this movement in the Gaza
Strip in the middle of war peace is not
something that happens when a war ends
peace happens between people peace is a
state of mind
and once you make this direct connection
with your enemy with someone from the
other side you you begin to realize you
begin to see them as individuals you
stop seeing sides you see people and
that is what what brings the change and
I’m not naive I know we cannot solve
this conflict just by sharing a heart
and then it’s it you know and the bad
news is we cannot change the world but
the good news is we can change our world
and we can change the world of those
around us we all can go out today and
friend a stranger we can go out today
and smile at a stranger we can we can go
out today and make a disturber
connection to someone from the other
side we live in a world where we are
constantly being told that we have to be
afraid of the other that we have to be
afraid of those who flee from war that
there’s some enemy out there and it’s
frustrating but the good news is peace
is in our hands and peace is what we can
create every day in our own communities
in our schools and our families and all
imagine every Palestinian had one friend
in Israel imagine every Israeli had just
one friend in Iran or in Palestine every
American had just one friend in
Afghanistan or Iraq imagine every German
had one friend in Nigeria or Syria can
you imagine the impact thank you very
much
[Applause] [Music]
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