piece two versions probably and I bet
you’re familiar with the word building
but if you’re like anyone else I’ve ever
met in my entire life you’re not
familiar with the word peace building
but contrary to what spell check things
it is indeed a real word which is good
because I’ve been studying it for four
semesters I’m learning to transform
violent opposition entities change I’m
learning to run away I’m learning to dig
into it instead of covering it up and
I’m learning to love its potential
instead of fearing its pain as part of
that I got to spend three and a half
months in Israel Palestine in Jordan and
Egypt and now I can’t summarize
everything I learned I’ve actually
really been struggling to figure out
what to say today because I lived in the
israeli-palestinian conflict for three
and a half months how can i summarize
without excluding an identity or a sugar
coating or oversimplifying and without
exceeding my time limit turns out it
can’t not even gonna try instead I’m
going to introduce you to the first
steps of peace building as I came to
understand them on my travels when I
first found out I was going on this trip
I remembered almost nothing about the
conflict
how son I knew that the Jews returned to
Israel and fought to establish a state
in 1948 I had vague memories of UN
resolutions and refugees and about a
six-day war and he owned Kippur War
which I definitely thought were the same
thing and which definitely aren’t I
think in general I just thought that the
Jews came home and it caused some
friction that escalated into a war that
displaced Palestinians and if the
Israelis and the Palestinians could just
figure out how to care for the refugees
everything else would just work itself
out I’m very glad I kept that to myself
so I’ve learned a lot mostly that all of
my assumptions were very wrong but I
also learned most importantly that
everybody has their own story and that
those stories those stories create a
narrative that affects how we perceive
the world around us and how we perceive
the world around us affects how we
interact with that world so if I want to
change actions I need to change
perceptions and if I want to change
perceptions I need to change narrative
and if I want to change the narrative I
need to tell different stories to show
you a little bit more of what I mean I’m
going to share with you part of my
learning process these are some of the
stories that taught me the first time my
narrative was really challenged was when
we traveled to Bethlehem and
homestays before then we’ve been
studying Judaism and the environmental
effects of conflict in a kibbutz a
socialist community in the southern
Negev desert Bethlehem was a completely
different story to get into the city and
anytime you want to leave you have to
pass through checkpoints and sometimes
it felt like everywhere you looked there
were soldiers staring at us one day in
one of our lectures we heard from a
leader of the First Intifada the
intifadas are usually characterized as
Palestinian revolts against the Israeli
occupation of the West Bank but to our
lecturer the first one at least was so
much more it was a way of taking back
his identity so he started with the
story of his grandma who grew up in a
village where Muslims Christians and
Jews looked side-by-side as neighbors
and best friends which is kind of
unheard of right now and then he told us
his uncle’s story about learning that
non-violence was a form of empowerment
as a way to take control of his life and
then he told us his experiences in the
First Intifada he talked about events
for lack of a better term for people who
would just go to the roof of their
apartment building and make a lot of
noise for like 15 or 20 minutes at a
time
just to say that they were there and
they could organize he talked about
Palestinian women who would hang their
laundry in the shape of the Palestinian
flag because it was illegal to fly with
so they would put their Reds in a
triangle on the side and then their
black screens and whites and stripes
coming off so that if you looked from
above or you looked up from below
you saw the Palestinian flag he told us
about the one in eight teams which is
actually a herd of eighteen cows that
Palestinians bought to challenge the
Israeli dairy industry in the West Bank
to him it was not a story of a revolt
but a movement to reclaim Palestinian
lives of course it was a little violent
and we asked him about this the Second
Intifada was much more violent and when
we asked him his face fell he said you
know the Geneva Conventions say that if
you’re living in occupation it is legal
to violently oppose that occupation he
said it’s really hard to convince people
not to when they know that
internationally it’s legal and that they
when they see that violence against them
but he also went on to tell us about a
program he started to train nonviolent
Palestinian leaders his story was so
inspiring
listening to him and two other stories
in Bethlehem I was introduced to a life
spent resisting oppression
I met refugees who still had the keys to
their old houses and I was reminded that
the wars I was learning about affected
the real people around me I could feel
my perception swinging toward Palestine
and then two months later my perception
shifted again when we went to live as
settlement is a protected Jewish town
inside the West Bank international
courts have ruled them illegal and we
had been hearing stories and witnessing
abusive relationships between settlers
and their Palestinian neighbors pretty
much the whole trip and at first we
weren’t really surprised a man implied
that if we’ve supported Palestinians we
supported Isis a woman told us that it
was time the Palestinians were kicked
out of Israel once and for all and sent
to live in the Sinai and my hostfamily
though wonderfully welcoming questioned
my social views they questioned by
pacifism and they questioned my faith in
all honesty I was beginning to shut
down and then against all eyes I made a
friend in a synagogue she is that you’re
younger than me and at the time that
meant that she was just starting her
mandatory service in the military she
knew we spent time in the West Bank and
so she started off by telling me what a
great relationship her settlement had
with the Palestinian neighbors around
them to kind of prove her point she
talked about one of her best friends in
high school who is Palestinian the
janitor obviously there’s a power
difference there but I was really
surprised because she really thought
that this relationship we had with her
janitor was a genuine friendship and
then to explain her confusion with this
Palestinian friend and her dedication to
army service
she told another story a few months
before he came she was hitchhiking home
from Jerusalem and as they approached
the traffic circle that led into her
community they saw a whole bunch of
emergency lights so she told with the
driver she said you can let me off here
I see my brother-in-law over there he’s
a paramedic so you can let me out here
and I’ll just go meet up with him you
can try and avoid the traffic so she
grabbed her bag got out of the car and
started walking toward her
brother-in-law he turned around saw her
and yelled run so she ran she had walked
into a terrorist attack violent
Palestinian extremists we’re using the
confusion to stab Israelis she found
herself in a bus station next to an
armed Israeli soldier waiting until it
was safe to go home she remembers that
she couldn’t stop shaking for the first
time I understood Israelis fear it
doesn’t justify the occupation
but the occupation doesn’t justify that
stabbing for what must have been the
thousandth time on this trip my
perceptions started to shift again the
finest story I’m going to tell you is
often silenced Israelis didn’t talk
about it
Palestinians in the West Bank didn’t
talk about it and when we asked nobody
had any answers and so I made a promise
that I was not going to contribute to
that silencing when I got back and that
I’m so I’m going to keep telling this
story and I’m not going to stop until
hopefully one day I won’t need to tell
it so I’m going to introduce you to God
that in the distance is Gaza seen from a
Jewish farming community right over the
border we spoke I don’t have time to
tell you everything I learned but I
could tell you a little bit of what one
Gaza told us when she managed to get a
permit out for the day in her words life
in Gaza is unpredictable
60% of Gazans under the age of 30 are
unemployed and suicide rates are rising
doctors have started diagnosing
permanent traumatic stress disorder and
the UN estimates that 300,000
Palestinian children are in need of
psychological care that they don’t have
access to she told us that Godwin’s get
2 to 4 hours of electricity every day if
they can afford it and two hours of
water that’s mostly sewage the UN also
estimates that Gaza will be unlivable by
2022 years since Hamas took control of
Gaza in 2007 Israel has launched three
offensives into the Gaza Strip 2008 2012
and 2014 this is a close-up of the Gaza
border wall with a remote-control
during those offensives Hamas hides in
their extensive tunnel system under the
city and most of the casualties are
women and children our speaker told us
that everybody has lost something
she lost a nephew her cousin lost her
legs and her sister lost an eye she says
we have been reduced to numbers they say
how many people died and not who died
she says we are numbers now but we are
not numbers she says we are people with
hopes and dreams she says I don’t know
what it feels like to not be afraid we
are living dead in Gaza telling stories
is not the be-all and end-all of peace
building but it is a beginning and it’s
a vital first step to changing the
narrative that changes the perceptions
that changes action and listening to
stories we are held accountable to
truths that make us feel uncomfortable
it is easier to sit nicely and the
knowledge that my side is right then to
consider the idea that maybe their side
is too it is easy to justify occupation
when all you know is fear and it is easy
to explain away by the resistance when
all you know is oppression listening to
stories makes us face truths that we’d
rather ignore and telling our own
stories forces others to do the same
thing every story has something to add
to the conversation so whether that
conversation is about Israel and
Palestine and Gaza or whether it’s about
politics and
right now which I’m kind of more afraid
of than the Middle East or whether it’s
about why your soccer team just can’t
get along anymore change the narrative
change the perceptions change the actions go tell your story