Bridging the Divide: Two Fathers Unite for Israel-Palestine Peace

It's been a beautiful day. And I thought the way to finish this day with all the animosity in the world. There's always been challenges in humanity. We tend to be very tribal as human beings. Grab a seat, please. But now it's happening even within cultures, within a culture. We've certainly seen that here in the United States where people, you know, on opposite parties, politically they used to fight like mad. I remember I worked with President Clinton and then I literally walked across and worked with Speaker Gingrich, who was the opposite party, was the speaker of the House. On the same day I coached both men from opposite parties. Today someone would shoot you in the head if you tried to do that. It's so absurd. They used to fight like crazy and they go have a beer together and talk and laugh and be people. Today we have this weird thing you can't talk to. Well, if you can't talk to anybody and you demonize everybody, then there's no possibility of peace. And so this is. I made the decision a few weeks ago, before things were out of control in the Middle east the way they are. And I saw this brief little interview with these two men that just brought me to tears, was so beautiful. And their names are Rami and Bassam. And one of them is an Israeli Jewish man from Jerusalem and the other is in Palestine. Actually he's going to be in Jericho, the oldest city in the world. And they're going to join us at 6am there. And I just wanted you, you can talk about what's possible. Like I said, a belief in what's possible doesn't matter. An experience is even better. And so I'd love you to watch and hear how these men that both share pain, they both had pain of losing their children from the opposite side. And yet there's a love between them like brothers. And they're working to create peace in the most difficult area probably of the world right now. What an incredible example, moving example.

Sam Aramin and Rami Elhanan came face.

To face with the price of war.

When their young daughters were killed. One by Israeli border police and the other by a Palestinian suicide bomber. One organization is bringing both Israeli and Palestinian families that have lost loved ones throughout the conflict together in hopes of finding a common basis for peace. I'm an Israeli who lost his daughter to a suicide bombing on 4th September 1997.

An Israeli border police shoot and kill my 10 years old daughter Abir.

All I can tell you that from that moment on until today, I devote my life to go everywhere possible, to talk to anyone possible.

We are peace activists. We are not victims and we refuse to live as victims.

This is not our destiny. It's not written anywhere that we have to go on killing each other.

I am proud to call this ex enemy. This man is my brother.

In many ways, he's the closest person to me on earth. He's much closer to me than many of my own people, many of my own family. We go around the country, we go from high school to high school. We talk to Israeli kids, we talk to Palestinian kids. And we tell them that our pain is exactly the same pain. And if we who have paid the highest price possible, if we who have every reason on us to want to kill each other, if we can call each other brother, anyone can.

Will you please. And welcome from across the world, Rami and Bassam. Please give up for him, Rami Mason. Thank you for joining us. We appreciate it so much. I know it's early in the morning for you, but your example is what the world needs to remind. We're all brothers and sisters can say that when it's easy. What's different about the two of you is you've done it with the greatest loss that most of us could ever imagine. Losing our children and losing it to what we would see as, quote, the other side. But rather than generalize and distort and delete, somehow you found the way to be brothers. And we'd love to hear what you want to share and then we'd love to ask you a few questions, if we may. So, first of all, thank you for joining us. We're just. It's a sacred time with you.

Thank you.

Thank you. Well, it's quite embarrassing. You took the words out of our mouth, but we feel great honor and thank you for having us.

Well, it's our. It's our honor. So would you like to go one at a time and just share from your heart how this came about and then we can ask you a few questions afterwards, if that works for the two of you.

We always fight about it. He always wins. So I will tell.

That's awesome.

My name is Amir Hanan. I'm 74 years old. Graphic designer by profusion I was born in Jerusalem, seventh generation. My mother was born in the old city of Jerusalem. Orthodox Jewish family. My father came to this country in 1946 after spending one year in Auschwitz. He was very badly wounded in the 48 war. He was the nurse of the Kirkland. And this is the reason why I'm able to Speak to you right now. I am a Jew. I'm an Israeli. And before anything else, I'm a human. The story I'm about to tell you starts and also ends on one particular day of the Jewish calendar which is known by the name of young people. This earliest day of the year. This is the day where you ask forgiveness for your sins. On this very day, 50 years ago, I was a very young soldier fighting this horrible October 73 war. We started it with a company of 11 tanks. We finished it. You don't destroy. I've lost. Over there in the desert of Sinai and across the Swiss Canal, some of my very close friends. And I came out of it a very angry and bitter and disappointed young man with one determination to detach myself from any kind of involvement or commitment. I got out of the army. I went to Bezalela Art School to become a graphic designer. I met my wife and got married, and we had four kids. And 40 years ago, on the very eve of Yom Kippur, September 1983, my daughter was born in Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem. Her name was Smadar. The name Smadar is taken from the Bible, the Song of Solomon. It means the grape of ban, which means the opening of the flower. She was really a very sparkling and vivid and joyful and energetic, happy little girl. She was very beautiful. She was an excellent student. She was a swimmer, she was a dancer. She played the piano. She was amazing. Everybody used to call her the princess. And we lived a very good life in our house in Jerusalem. My wife, which is the professor in the Hebrew University, teaching education, my three daughters and this princess, in what seemed to be the perfect, sheltered, protected lives. In so many ways, you could say that we put ourselves inside a big bubble, completely detached from the outside world, minding our own business. I was doing graphic design for the right wing or the left wing or ever. And life was very comfortable and beautiful. This went on until about 26 years ago, on the 4th of September, 1997, just a few days before Yom Kippur. It was the first day of school. This model of ours was blown up to millions of pieces who were Palestinian suicide bombers. Hamas members blew themselves up in Benihuyo street in the center of Jerusalem. They killed five people that day, including three little girls. One of these girls was my 14 years old. Thursday afternoon and the beginning of a very long and a very cold night, which continues until today. At first, when you hear about the explosion, you keep hoping that maybe this time this finger will not turn towards you gradually you find yourself running in the streets, trying to find her. She completely disappeared. And you go from hospital to hospital, from police station to police station, many long frustrating hours, until eventually, very late at night, you find yourself in the morgue. And this finger is stuck right between your eyes. And you see this side, which you will never ever be able to forget for the rest of your life. Then you come back home, the house immediately filled with thousands and thousands of people coming to pay respect, to offer condolences. These are the seven days of the Jewish mourning period. You're kind of enveloped by these thousands of people in a very clever, traditional way that is designed to ease your passage from one kind of life to another. On the eighth day, they go home. Suddenly you're left alone. You need to wake up, you need to stand up and trace yourself. And you have to make a decision. What are you going to do now with this new unbearable burden on your shoulders? What are you going to do with this anger that eats you alive from within? And there are only two ways to choose from. And the first one is obvious. When someone kills your 14 years old little girl, you are so angry and you want to get even. This is natural, this is human. This is the way most people choose, the way of revenge and retaliation. But then after a while, you start to think, you know, we're human beings, we're not animals, we can use our heads. You start asking yourself question, will killing anyone will bring her back? Becauseing pain to someone will ease this unbearable pain? The answer is certainly not so. In a very graduate and complicated process, you come to the other option, which is much more difficult. Trying to understand why did it happen? How could such a horrible thing happen? What can cause someone to be that angry, that mad, that desperate, that hopeless, that he's willing to blow himself up? With 14 years old little girl, you have some kind of connection to it yourself. And then the most important question of them all. What can you do personally in order to prevent this unbearable pain from other people, from other family? Well, it's not easy. It takes time. It took me almost a year. Foolishly enough at the beginning, I thought that I could go on with my life, pretending as if nothing had happened. Go back to my studio, try to live the normal life. But nothing was normal anymore. And I was not the same person anymore. And about a year later, on some occasion, I met a big man who changed my life completely. His name was Itzhak Funkata. He was a religious Jewish guy, you know, with a big kippah on his Head. And you know how we tend to put people into trolls and we stigmatize people and we judge people by the way they dress and look. And I was certain that this guy with the kippah is a fascist and radical. And he eats Arabs for breakfast. And I prepare myself to fight him. And we started talking, told me about his son Eric, who was kidnapped and murdered by Hamas in 1994, and about this organization that he created of people who lost their loved ones, Israelis and Palestinians together, who wanted to fight against this situation. And I got curious and he invited me over to watch a meeting with this group of crazy people. And I said okay, and I went to see. It was 25 years ago. I was standing aside, very detached and reluctant and very cynical as I always am. And I was watching this group of crazy people coming down from the buses, walking towards me, shaking my hand for peace, hugging me, crying with me. And I was so deeply shocked and so deeply. You see, I was 47 years old at the time. And I'm still ashamed to admit it was the first time ever in my life I have met Palestinians as human beings, not as workers in the streets, not as terrorists, not as transparent people, as human beings who carry the same burden that I carry, who suffer exactly like I suffer. And I was so, so deeply moved. I remember seeing this old Arab lady coming down from the bus, this long black, traditional Palestinian dress. And she had a picture of a six years old kid on her chair, exactly like my wife carried the name of our daughter's Madari. On earth. I'm not a religious person. I'm afraid that I'm not the greatest believer on earth. I have no way of explaining what happened to me back then 25 years ago. All I know is from that moment on I devote my life to go everywhere possible to talk to anyone possible. People who will not listen, people who will listen to convey this very basic and very simple message which says we are not doomed. It's not our destiny to keep on killing each other in this holy land of ours forever. And we can change it. There is only one way to do so. This is by talking to each other. Because it will not stop unless we took. So this is what we do at the parent circle. About 650 families, Israelis and Palestinians, with one common denominator. We understand that we lost our children because of this abnormal situation in which one people is controlling the other. This is called the occupation. When one people is not free and one people has all the privileges, it's not working. And the price is blood. So we are banging our heads against this very high wall of hatred and fear the divide our two nations today. And we put cracks in it, little cracks. Through these little cracks, a little light comes in. A little light can drive away a lot of darkness until we will put those walls down. Because the alternative is Oligon paper. And we have an enormous ally on our side, which is the power of our pain. And you should know that the power of pain is tremendous. It's very much similar to the nuclear energy, like this horrible energy. You can use it in order to bring darkness and destruction and pain and death to people. And you can use this energy in order to bring light and hope and warmth. So we go around the country, we go from high school to high school. We talk to Israeli kids, we talk to Palestinian kids, and we tell them that our blood is exactly the same color, that our pain is exactly the same thing, and our tears are just as matter. And if we who have paid the highest price possible, if we have every reason on earth to want to kill each other, if we can call each other brother, anyone can. Anyone should. Thank you so much.

Assam. Will you share with us your journey?

So good evening, America. Thank you, brother. Thank you, Tony, for inviting us briefly. It's very difficult to grow up under strange occupation. I am talking as a kid, people that they don't look like you, they don't speak your language and they come to control your life. And you don't know why they come to my village, to my neighborhood, to occupy us. Simply, we hated them as Palestinians, as kids. And we don't need education to hate those strangers. Very briefly, I notice that at the age of 12 that those soldiers, the Israeli soldiers, they become very nervous and crazy when they saw the Palestinian flag. And I don't understand why. So with other four kids, we create a local military group, we call it, at the age of 13. And we start our struggle by raising the Palestinian flag on the trees around our school. It was a very dangerous mission. If they catch you, you go to jail for six months to one year. But this is the tool that we need to use in order to make them crazy. That's it. We don't understand, like to free Palestine or create a Palestinian state. We don't understand that we want to feel safe as kids because we have no safer place for ourselves. In fact, at the age of 16, we find some old weapons in a cave with other military tools that we don't know how to use it. But two of my friends throw two grenades on the Israeli soldiers patrols in our village near Hebron. And luckily in that time, no one killed, no one injured, because they don't know how to use it in a professional way. And at the age of 17, one year later, we have been arrested. So the first one get 21 years in jail. 19, 15, 14. And I had seven years. In fact, I learned in jail, if you know your enemy, you can defeat him or you can kill him. If you only hate him, you will kill yourself. So in fact, it was like a wisdom for me. I said, I want to kill my enemy and not to kill myself. So I start to study Hebrew, the language of the enemy. The first to know how to kill Rami in that time. Sorry, it's not personal. Then shortly, I watch a movie about the Holocaust. The Holocaust at that time. I never hear anything about it, except something it's not. We don't learn about it at all. You know, for me, someone called Hitler, I don't know from where, this Hitler who killed 6 million Jewish people. But it's a big lie, so you never think about it. But I understand this movie is about Hitler and the Jews. And I want to enjoy seeing this movie as kind of revenge, in spite, in my background, like it's a lie just to see someone torture those Jews, kill them, arrest them, occupy them, because I am in their jails. So what happened? After a few minutes, suddenly I found myself crying in sympathy with those innocent people. I start to hide my tears from other prisoners because, you know, you are crying for the Jews and we are in their jails. It's very complicated. Briefly, I decide that I want to know more about this big life. It's really happened, or it's just a movie. Which led me, after more than 25 years, after that, to make my master degree about the Holocaust in Bradford University in the uk. Then after that I started to visit death camps in Germany. But it starts as a tool to know your enemy in order to know how to fight them or to defeat them. Then I understand something very basic, that if you know more, you act much better. If you don't know, simply you don't know. And to be honest, I find it perfect not to know, because you always agree with yourself, with your narrative, with your history, whatever. And when you know something different, you start to suffer. We said in Arabic, because you cannot keep silent. You can imagine it's a very long seven years. Briefly, their goal is to kill our humanity every moment in jail, because we are the bad guys. You know, it's more easy for the Americans to understand the bad guys. And for us, they are the bad guys. They are the occupiers. They are not our example. We are freedom fighters. So we need to survive and to continue to protect our humanity in order to continue our struggle. This is how we survive. I get released after seven years and I still believe in army struggle as the only way to talk to those people. It means the Israeli army, those are the Israeli people that we know as Palestinians. In 93, suddenly we have peace. Oslo agreement between the PLO and Israel for the first time. And I start to see the same ex terrorists or killers, whatever they describe us, the prisoners, they became generals in the Palestinian security forces. They became the Palestinian Authority. So what happened? One day they are terrorists, next day they are partners for peace. It's an Israeli political decision. And American, in fact, that's it. It's a long story. But like most of the Israelis and the Palestinians, I support this agreement because I want to live in peace as every normal human being. In fact, I get married and I have six kids. Suddenly, you know, I become from a small family. We are 16 brothers and sisters only. So those kids, they became my Palestine, my promised land, my word. I want to do everything possible to protect them. I will never allow my son to be in the Israeli Jews because he don't know. Because they want to raise the flag. I am here, I know how to raise them up. And we, we have peace. Unfortunately, if you live in Palestine and Israel, it's not the same living. But still you have no safer place for yourself. And sometimes, if you survive, it's only by chance, which is not a normal life. After I discovered that more than 100 years were trying to kill each other, to defeat each other. And the result, until now, Israel is not safe. And Palestine is not free. But more blood, more pain, more victims. So we need to change our way to achieve the same goal. In fact, in 2005 I was one of the co founders of a group called Combatants for Peace, which is from ex Israeli soldiers and officers who refused to serve in the occupied territories or in Palestine because they love Israel, because it's against the Jewish values, which is very strange for us as Palestinians, because it's against the Zionist values, which totally very strange, you know, Zionist with values for us, it doesn't work together. So who is those people? I wish to meet them. So it was the first meeting in 2005 for Palestinians with civil etc officers. Rama's son was one of them, Elik. So this is how I get to know this noble enemy. Back in 2005, we discovered that we are the same. After one year meetings, we became 300 members. We discovered that we are the same. It means, yes, we want to kill each other to achieve the same thing. We want peace and security. But of course, each one from his point of view. And I believe you know Jalaluddin Rumi or Rumi, he says, beyond right and wrong, there is a field. Meet me there. So we decide to meet each other. Maybe we can survive. And this is what happened the end of this year. We create combatants for peace. And this was our slogan. What Nelson Mandela says, if you want to make peace with your enemy, you need to work with your enemy. Then your enemy become your partner. And this was our goal, to prove that there is a partner for peace in the other side. In fact, two years later, on 16 January 2007, an Israeli border police shoot and killed my 10 year old daughter Abir in front of her school from a distance of 15 to 20 meters. And her hit from the back. Abir fell down and two days later she passed away in Hadassah hospital where she born and where Samadar born and died. You know, between Abir and Samadar it's 10 years. We don't know each other, but it was our common enemy. It's the same enemy who take off the lives of our daughters. It's the Israeli occupation. Unfortunately, if you ask the killer of Samadar or Abir, why we don't know on this Madar because she's an Israeli and Aber because she's a Palestinian, of course. Two hours later, I received my brother Rami and his wife and more than 30 Israeli families who come to stay with me in the hospital three days, praying for little Abir until she pass away. You know, from the beginning I said, I wish Abir will be the last victim between the Israelis and the Palestinians. I don't ask for revenge because we need to stop the circle of blood and we need to double our efforts to achieve peace. Especially now, because I have another five kids. I don't want them to be victims. And this is exactly what I said to the killer of my daughter. I call him a victim. When I meet him in the court after three and a half years, I said to him, you are not a hero, you are not a warrior. You didn't kill the enemy or the terrorist. You need to know that you killed 10 years innocent girl. And if you are proud of that, you can enjoy your crime. I don't ask for revenge because I don't take revenge from victims. For me, you are lot less victim than your victim. But in any day in your life, if you come to ask me to forgive you on your knees, I will take my revenge. I will forgive you without any mercy. It's not because of you at all. It's because of myself. Because I really love my daughter very much. And because I have another five kids. I don't want them to grow up as victims to you. In fact, two days later, I joined the parents circle after I lost my daughter. Because I know my brother Lami. Two years before I lost my daughter, we became a very close friends. So I am familiar with this noble organization. But of course, in my worst dream, I don't want to join this amazing group. You know, we want to prove that we can be partners for peace only. We don't need to love each other. We don't even need to like each other. I still love you, Rami. But we need to respect each other. You know, Tony, always I said you can enjoy hating me forever. In the end, you will have heart attack. Just respect me, my borders, my human rights, my right to exist, to live in peace and security. I will respect yours and we can survive. But we prove that we are human beings. We can be a real partner, we can be real friends and brothers. And in our case, we can be a family. We kill each other for the land, especially for Jerusalem, which is a holy place for the Christians, for the Jewish. It's more than holy for us, for Muslims. But we kill each other for Jerusalem. And we meet at each other under the ground of Jerusalem. And I am not sure if Jerusalem know who we are. It's up to us to continue killing each other or to understand that we can live on this land. We born to live are not talking to each other. Unfortunately. As long as there is rainy occupation continue, we will continue to sacrifice the blood of our kids from both sides to protect the holy sons of Jerusalem. We understand that we respect each other. We can live in peace. Let us look for the future. We will never improve the past. It's over. For our kids. It means Israelis and Palestinians. Thank you very much for listening.

Well, thank you both for sharing your stories. It's almost overwhelming. In the environment we're in right now. You both have managed to develop a level of compassion, the ability to step in the other's shoes, in spite of a pain that most people would never be able to separate. I know you still carry that pain. What is your advice to the rest of the world? First, I'll Take some simpler for people who haven't killed, have their children be murdered, still treat each other with such disrespect and despise each other, try to harm or destroy each other's reputations or won't even speak to each other in the same country. I mean, what you're taking on is so much greater. I'm just curious, what would your advice be to those in Europe and those here in America who are so divided and the issues are not life and death, but they're treated as if they are? Do you have any advice you could share from your life experience? That could be a message that we could carry to some of those people. And then we'd like to come back and talk about what's happening in both of your countries and both of your people. But I'd love to hear what your thoughts would be for those who are dealing with something far less but have the same level of intensity and resentment. Nelson Mandela is famous for saying, you know, resenting another is like taking poison and expecting your enemy to die because it destroys us. And I know you both understand that because you found a way through this. It's so touching and inspiring. But what would you say to these people that are making things so intense and creating such separation? And here in America, people have that over, whether they like Biden or Trump or not even, like, they despise the other. There are families that won't even talk to each other. Friends end friendships over these things. And there's no life and death, but they act like it is. You guys have done it with life and death. What recommendations? What insights might you offer us if possible?

You know, Gandhi says, I'm not going to, like, spend my life running after a dog to beat him because he beat me, bite me. You know, it's very difficult, but it's logic. You know, I said from the beginning, even to kill this Israeli or the Israeli or even the. The rest of the Jewish on earth, you will never meet your daughter again. That's it. Number two, I am not a killer. Number three, when you go to kill means you need to prepare your other kids to kill or to be killed. I discovered that we kill our kids with our own hands without even taking responsibility because we will continue their way. Yes, this is what we. This is the culture. This is the normal thing, in fact, because we are in a conflict. So when you discover that, you need to teach yourself, I am bigger than my pain. I am bigger than my sadness. I am a human being. I have responsibilities. When you go to Take revenge. And I said to this, to this victim that I can kill you, I can kill another two, maybe three, maybe five. But I am not a killer. I'm not going to be unique. So you are not going to solve the problem. I have another five kids, so it's my responsibility. And you know, an eye for an eye will make all the whole world blind, which is a throne.

Yes.

When you discover that your enemy is exactly like you, this is another point. But when we ask for justice, what's the meaning of justice? Justice is. Rami wants Madar back, I want Hagir back. There is no justice. At least this is what I ask him. You need to punish yourself because you kill a kid. Even if the authorities did punish you, maybe encourage you. When he discovered that in fact he become another human being, he really regret. I don't envy him. And we were in a process to meet each other, to ask forgiveness, but he was not ready because it's very complicated process in the Israeli army. One day he will come because he's not a serial killer, because he's a human being. I know that.

So notice the identity belief here that plays such a role. Not a killer, but also to turn that and realize that if I don't change this, I'm killing my own children. Changes with a belief change, especially global belief change. And you both have managed in the midst of this to come up with a different belief and believe it's nothing feeling, but absolutely, certainly about what something means and giving a consequence. So that's a beautiful answer. Thank you very much. Bassam Rami, how would you communicate this to someone who's dealing with these issues? And how do you look at it?

You know, there is a very old Jewish saying, it says don't do to others what is hateful for you.

Yes.

Some people say it's the basic of Judaism. It's a lot of wisdom in this. And you have to put yourself in the shoes of the other guy. You have to put yourself in a position that you will not be concentrated only on your pain. Another Israeli, another Jewish saying, says, my pain is my pain. There is no pain like mine. And it's right. I mean, when someone hits your finger, it's more difficult for you than seeing someone lying on the street. But you need to get out of it in order to understand the environment that you are living in and how to solve problems. Otherwise you'll be stuck within yourself forever and nothing will pay at all.

And being stuck within yourself is usually the ultimate pain because the mind will always Find something to be upset about. Right. Today, people get upset about what somebody writes. That has nothing to do with them. People are outraged. I asked a group of people recently which would you rather be happy or a bit outraged? And, you know, it was an interesting response because a bunch of people there first said, happy, but then they said, honestly, the way I live, I get outraged pretty easy. Because outrage, anger, creates a surge of energy, testosterone, it pushes our nervous system. It makes us feel certain, it makes us feel significant, which are human needs, but it leaves us dead inside because there's no connection. There's no growth. There's no spiritual growth, no emotional growth, no any formal growth. Tell us about. I'd like to hear from you, Bassam. When you talk about the Israeli occupation, you know, many people's perception in the west is, well, since 2005, there hasn't been an occupation in Gaza since 2005. You know, obviously Hamas has been running the show, and Hamas is, you know, taking great resources and not help their own people. What's your understanding or perception of that? How do you perceive that? Because I'm curious to hear that, because I've heard multiple sides of the story. You're living it. So I'd love to hear directly from you rather than someone who has an opinion.

Absolutely. You know, I don't blame you because the west, especially the Americans, they don't know who occupied who. Even so, it's very good to know a little bit that Gaza was free in 2005. No. In fact, it's the biggest jail on earth with more than 2 million people. It's a real jail. They have one gate, Israel decide who will leave and who will enter. So it was a big joke that they are free and Hamas just appeared yesterday. Tony, we are talking about 75 years of occupation, of oppression, to blame Hamas. It's not true. And always I said, as long as the occupation continue, we will have Hamas, we will have Fatah, we will have Islamic Jihad. We will have. And they have a good reason. They said, we are fighting the occupation according to the international law, Operation Create Resistance. This is what Jabotinsky said. And all the laws in the world allow the people who are under the occupation to resist. And no one can tell them how to resist. Now, what I say to the Palestinians, to my people, of course we have the right to resist and to use armor. And we don't care how the rest of the world describe us. We are protecting our land, our kids, our lives. But we try it for more than 100 years. So let us Use another tool. It means the non violence together even with the Israelis, with the international community, to go to the international law, you know, to the UN which is another type of struggle. But I remember before Oslo agreement, PLO described exactly like Hamas today killed terrorist organization. Their goal is to kill the Israelis and to throw them to the sea. And what happened? They became at once for peace. Today, if Israel have the right to protect themselves or to defend themselves, of course, but they have no right to occupy another people's land. They need to blame themselves in the end. We are dying, both Israelis and Palestinians. We are killing each other because the Israelis are scared. I am not going to pay the price of their ongoing fear forever. The Americans, the Europeans need to see me exactly as they see the Israelis. I have the right to live and to exist, to be free to. This is exactly. It's opposite the picture that the west know. And it's very easy to, you know, unfortunately, like the policy of United States of America. I talk to like me and Rami with almost half of the Congress. If we talk on the media, it's another issue. If we talk as human beings, the personal level, yes, they know what they are doing. They know the problem. And I'm not going to pay the price of the guilt of the world against the Jewish people. I know that, but it's not me. I paid the price of the holocaust that I never committed. And I don't know anything even about it. We become the victim of the victim. So if there is peace, if in the occupation tomorrow, tomorrow Hamas will disappear. And imagine, Tony, if there is a peace agreement between the Israelites and the Palestinians, there is no 7th of October. It didn't start in the 7th of October. But imagine they invested in billions and billions of dollars to build this separation wall between Gaza and Israel. It fell down in two hours, unfortunately.

So you see Gandhi's approach, Martin Luther King's approach as the only approach that can really solve this. And it's proven in two different countries opposite. How do you do that when so many have been had so much pain, just like both of you've had on both sides. How do you get the Israelis to be able to feel secure enough to let go when they believe that you want to extinguish them, meaning the Palestinians and vice versa. The perception on both sides is we want to extinguish the other. You know, what do you see as the solution 2 state solution? Many just roll their eyes at that because it was offered at one time and rejected, as you know, years ago under Clinton, the question is, you know, is that possible? What do you see if that peaceful approach was to occur? What has to happen for a Gandhi approach or Martin Luther King approach to occur in your mind? I'd love to hear your point of view. And then I'd love to hear yours as well, Rami.

Well, first of all, you have to be honest. You have to tell the truth. And you have to understand that you cannot put 2 million people in a box, close the COVID and expect that nothing will happen. Yes, you have to tell them that the Hamas people that created the massacre on October 7th were 10 and 12 years old kids in 2014 when the Israeli army attacked Gaza. So it's a cycle of violence and we have the moral authority to tell the truth. And this is the truth. Now the solution is on the table, waiting to be signed. Everybody knows what needs to be done in order to finish this stupid conflict. Tomorrow morning, one state or two states or 10,000 said, this is not the issue at all. One word is essential. Without it, nothing will happen. And the word is respect. Yes, you have to be able to respect the guy next to you exactly as you want to be respected, no more and no less. Once you achieve this, everything else is technicalities. You can have federation, confederation. There are so many ethnicities countries in the world like the United States, like Belgium, like other countries who can live together with respect to one another in democracy, in equal rights, while in our case, between the river and the sea, there are 9 million people. Half of them are under military rule, half of them don't have any democratic rights whatsoever. And this is an abnormal situation and we paid the price of it. So we have the moral authority to tell them we need to look at each other in the eye, we need to be able to respect each other. We need to look at each other in the level of equal equality. Otherwise we will go on fighting each other forever.

How do you get to that level of respect with so much water under the bridge, so to speak? How do you get to there.

People like Bassam? By looking. Look, I was 46 when I started this journey. And I'm a victim of the Israeli upbringing system. I was brainwashed. I never met any Palestinians. I never heard Arabic. I closed the radio when it was Arabic. And 26 years ago I started the journey towards the other side, which I never saw, towards the music, towards the history, towards the narrative, the language, the culture, everything that was deliberately and viciously hidden for me. Because we are talking about two societies at war and they need to prepare the young generation to be able to sacrifice themselves to some khan. And the only way to do it is by hiding the other side and demonizing the other side, Dehumanizing the other side. So this is our task, using this journey in order to open our eyes, to open our minds, and to find new ways. And this is two major conclusions that I have made. In the end of this journey, you have to give up two major things. One is the victimhood mentality. You have to get rid of the victimhood mentality. You have to stop looking back, you have to stop digging into your own wounds, and you have to look forward. And the second most important thing is giving up the Jewish superiority. You are not superior to anyone else. You are the same human beings. No one is born a killer. No one is born a terrorist. No one is born a soldier. We need to treat each other like human beings.

Bassam, it sounds like by your description, your own journey, you had the same situation. You didn't even know about the Holocaust, right? And the experience that the other side did see both your understanding of the other side was only conditioned by the environments around you. How do you deal with that when there's the geopolitical aspect, you know, Iran is funding so much of this and I don't know they have either of your interests in mind completely. I don't know. Maybe they have the Palestinian interest of mine, I don't know. But it's. It certainly doesn't look like it at times. It looks like it's their interest that are mine. How do you deal with that? I mean, that's a third party that's playing a role in this as well, in the conflict. How do you look at that? Assam, I'm curious.

If you talk about Iran, the third party. No, we have maybe around the 30 party. It's not the first party. We have a lot of parties. So for that we are victims to this policy, both Israelis and Palestinians, unfortunately. But your question always I said like one day after peace, in fact, I want to settle in Colorado and Denver. I love it. And I will leave Ram here with the Palestinians to continue make peace and reconciliation the only solution. I want to send my kids to their school and get them back safe in any place on the earth. This is my state. Just imagine that always I said the Palestinians, they didn't kill 6 million Israelis and the Israelis didn't kill 6 million Palestinians yet. And there is a German ambassador in Tel Aviv and there is an Israeli ambassador in Bahrain. Four years after 6 million victims, the best relationship on earth between Germany And Israel. How come? Briefly, we can do it. The level of hatred and the blood, they didn't arrive to this level. But we need a brave leader to lead us towards the future again, to release us from the very painful past, which is over.

And a leader that's really driven by the same values, obviously, as Gandhi or Martin Luther King and that peaceful approach. And maybe it's also people being exhausted by the pain enough that they finally demand peace. Historically, that's the only thing that changes things over time. But what a beautiful example with Germany. That's a great example you give of what's really real. That's really wonderful. Let's have some questions from our audience, if you don't mind. We have some questions here.

Please.

Just remember, if it's a difficult question for Rami, please.

Yes.

Thank you for being here. What is the energy of the public? Not the military, but the Palestinians and the Israelis, especially after the October 7th situation. I know a lot of the Israelis are not happy with Netanyahu, and I don't know what that means.

But as a whole.

Are the people in Israel and the people in Palestine seeking peace? Or is there anger and hostility between the people? We are talking about two bereaved societies, two very painful societies, two humiliated societies, and two very angry societies, especially after October 7th. But as we always say, the conflict did not start on October 7th and will not end on October 8th. And we are licking our wounds. We are suffering from defeats. And the price is enormous. It never had been such a high price. And I always said throughout my years, my 25 years of going and speaking to people which were asking me what will be the solution? And I'm telling them, and I'm telling them today also, peace will prevail the minute the price of not having peace will exceed the price of peace.

That's so true.

Very much near situation. There is not one house in Israel and in Palestine where people are not crying, where people did not lose a member of family, a kid, a brother, a mother. And this is unbearable situation, which on one hand increases the hatred and the anger. But I believe that in the end, one minute will come, that you will understand that anger will take you nowhere, that the decisions that are being made out of anger are bad decisions. And then you need to rise above your pain and above the current situation and look to the future. And the future is very bright. Was some sense that we are not going to go on killing each other forever. And he's absolutely right. We need to find a way, the power within ourselves to Move forward to stop digging into the wounds of the past and understand that we are doomed to live here together. The Palestinians will not be thrown to the desert. The Israelis will not be thrown to the sea. We have to share this land as one state or two states, or 10,000 states, or one big graveyards under it.

Well said. That's true. Most people's lives. Yes, go ahead.

In fact, of course, I agree with every single word what to Rami says. People are very angry and the time of conflict, they want more blood, they want revenge. But just to let you know that it's more easy for me to raise up my voice in the Palestinian side than my brothers in the Israeli side. It's very difficult. If you even posted a post on Facebook, next day they will arrest you. This is the democratic regime now in Israel. Professors in the universities, not normal people. They will go to arrest them.

Yasser Ami, my wife.

What happened with your wife?

My wife was. She's a professor in the Hebrew University and she was arrested on October 9 for putting Jean Paul Sartre quotation in an inner WhatsApp group which says the slave has raised up his head. That was enough for the police to contact investigation. But this is nothing compared to Palestinian citizens of Israel, which are being arrested, which are being bullied, which are being denied of their rights, which are being persecuted in a way that the whole country went crazy. Once you dare to say one sound, your head is immediately cut off because the anger and the sensitivity is so bitter that you need to be very brave person in order to open your mouth. Bassam is admired by his society. He's respected by his society. I cannot say about myself the same.

And Bassam, if I may ask, why are you so revered and respected in and admired in your society? I'm sorry for my ignorance, but I'd love to know why.

Yeah, you know, I didn't come from like, outside to say the Palestinians. This is right, this is wrong. This is how you need to act. I am not the expert. I am the people. I am from here. I paid the highest price. I lost my daughter. So I have the right to talk. And when I talk, I am not threatened. I am working for them. It's not a personal problem between me and the state of Israel. I am part of the Palestinian society. And this is what we are asking people. It's very normal that the people who are under the occupation, they just want to live in peace. So they ask for peace and security more than the oppressors. It's normal. And always I said Even if they describe us as traitors. Traitors of today will be the heroes of tomorrow. This is our way. When we talk about our daughters, our hearts, an open wind forever. We will never give up. We will never get tired. It's our responsibility. I want to look in the eyes of my daughters and my grandsons and daughters that I did everything possible to achieve peace. This is why we continue doing what we are doing.

That's beautiful. Give them a hand. That's absolutely gorgeous. The traitors of today will be the heroes of tomorrow. One or two more questions. Yes. Thank you so much for being here.

I'm just curious. We didn't talk about.

Is there frustration that the Americans are.

Supporting the state of Israel or the.

Europeans haven't stepped in to provide peacekeeping? What is your thoughts around global support.

To stop really the conflict. Conflict and the slaughter of all these people? You know, I'm a son of a Holocaust survivor. My late father was an Auschwitz graduate. And I said this the end of every lecture that we had while they took my grandparents to the ovens back in Europe. Eighty years ago, the free and civilized world stood aside, never lifting one finger. And today, while these two crazy nations are massacring each other and there is a genocide in Syria and the atrocities in the Ukraine and wherever you look, and the free and civilized world is still standing aside, doing nothing and standing aside while a crime is being committed is also. Now, we don't want you to input our conflicts to your country. You have enough problems of your own. We don't need you to be pro Israeli or pro Palestine. This will not help us a bit. We demand of you to be pro peace and to be against injustice and against this ongoing situation which one people is dominating another people. This is the essence of the problem. It must be solved. It can be solved by the help of the nations outside. And I will conclude with the message of a Jew, and I am a Jew, with the utmost respect to my people, to my history, to my tradition. And I will tell you that ruling and oppressing and humiliating and occupying millions and millions of human beings without any democratic right whatsoever is not Jewish.

Period.

There are no two ways about it. And being against it is not antisemitism. And if you get into an argument, you can quote.

Beautiful.

So I just want to ask you to remember his name. His name is Rahman Khanan. Because you are going to argue a.

Lot.

I will say like this. You know, Matthew Lothat King says, in the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends, the most important thing is not to keep silence because if it's happened to you you are not going to find anyone to raise up his voice for you because you never raise up your voice for the others. We are very connected to each other. Yes you need to be pro justice and peace and humanity and democracy for everyone. When you say justice for the Palestinians it means automatically security for the Israelis. So in this case you are going to be pro both sides and this is what we are asking for and we find a new slogan which says from the river to the sea everyone must be free. Everyone. Otherwise there is no solution. We will continue to fight unfortunately and this is what we, we want to avoid because we are equals as human beings.

That's so beautiful. God bless you both and thank you for joining us and with us your insights, your, your gifts from God. Thank you so much.

Sa.