Interview with Israeli, Palestinian Seeds | BBC World Service

[1]

Two Seeds—an Israel and a Palestinian—sat down with the BBC World Service's Ritula Shah in London. To listen to the interview (which starts at the 16:50 mark), click here [2]. 

[2]Hello, and welcome to Outlook from the BBC World Service. I’m Ritula Shah. On today’s programme: "Armed and dangerous." We have an insight into life as a private security contractor in Iraq. Transported from a refugee camp in Nepal and three months into a new life in the US, Outlook hears from the family who is still grappling with change. And the teenagers building peace and friendship across the Israeli-Palestinian divide.

The following interview begins at the 16:50 mark. 

Sahar Warshavsky is an Israeli teen who lives in the southern coastal city of Ashkelon. But unusually, he has friends who are Palestinian. Decades of conflict in the Middle East have left both sides mistrustful and angry, and the two societies are almost totally separate. But Seeds of Peace is an organization trying to change that. It brings young people on all sides of conflict zones in both the Middle East and South Asia together. A select few are able to spend time together, at a residential camp held in the US. Sahar, who’s 17, has spent time there, as has Kareem Uri, a 19-year old Palestinian now studying in Washington. They’re both currently in the UK, and when they came into the Outlook studio, Sahar began by describing his attitudes before he went into the peace camp.

Sahar: When actually I came to Camp, I thought, “I’m ready.” I thought, “I know what I’m dealing with.” I thought, “I know what it is going to be, and I know a little bit about this situation and about conflict.” But when you hear the stories of the other side, and when you actually meet a person from the other side of the conflict, a Palestinian (which I had never met before), it was really nice to hear them, to actually understand how they see it. It’s completely different from what the media is telling you.

Ritula Shah: Kareem, what about you? How old were you when you got involved and how much did you know about the conflict?

Kareem: I was 14, and I turned 15 at Camp when I first went in 2005. I lived in Ramallah, where there were shootings and bombings. I was there [Ramallah] in 2002 and 2003 when the sieges would happen and the curfews. The view obviously was very negative before I attended Seeds of Peace because you only looked at the blood aspect of it. You only looked at what the other side has done to you.

Ritula Shah: And Sahar, you were growing up in Ashkelon, which is one of the places where sometimes there are rocket attacks and so on. Was that something you ever experienced first hand?

Sahar: Yes, like lately during the Cast Lead operation, we were bombed. My city was bombed.

Ritula Shah: We’re talking about the invasion of Gaza, last year?

Sahar: Yes, last year. One of the best things this [Seeds of Peace] gave me was the opportunity to be in touch to with someone from the other side of the conflict. So, during the Cast Lead operation, I was talking by email with one of my Palestinain friends. And I was asking him, and we had a debate about what is going on. And we had really, really nice talks. Actually we both came to the same conclusion that if both of the sides were talking about it, they wouldn’t have any operation there, so it was a shame.

Ritula Shah: Kareem, when you first met other Israeli teenagers, what was your impression? Were they as you expected?

Kareem: The first time I met Israeli teenagers, or Israelis in general, was in 2005. A sad reality, which a lot of people don’t know, is we’re completely segregated in the region. It’s illegal for Israelis to come to the Palestinian territories, and it’s almost impossible for Palestinians to go to the Israeli territories. I didn’t know what to expect, because I’d seen them on border patrol and at checkpoints, but never not in uniform. So when I first went, all of us as teenagers, we sort of had the same problems; this and that, what normal teenagers around the world want to talk about. But also in the dialogue sessions, when we would get more political and talk about the situation, I noticed a lot of them had—not a distorted image of the conflict—but a misknowledge of the conflict. As did I. I think it was a learning experience because we all had virgin information that wasn’t distorted by different channels of media, which was the main source for all of us.

Ritula Shah: So how did it change you, then, having those conversations? What do you think changed? Is there a concrete example of something you now feel very differently about?

Kareem: Prior to attending Seeds of Peace, I always used to agree with suicide bombings. I used to think that because, you know, we’re a force of no weapons and no army fighting the 4th largest army in the world, that was our only option. However, after Seeds I no longer agree with suicide bombings. However, I do rationalize how these small fractions of our society are kind of induced into this. So I no longer support blood shed of any kind on both sides. I no longer think two wrongs make a right.

Ritula Shah: One last thought: when you were actually at Camp, were there, we talked about differences, but were there similarities that you weren’t expecting between the two cultures, between the two sides? Sahar?

Sahar: I’ll give you the best example, I think. In the last days of Camp you have games, they’re called Color Games. You actually take the Camp and you divide it into green and blue, or two colors, and you forget your nationality completely. It’s all about winning. It’s all about helping your friends to win. It’s all about helping your team. And you actually forget your nationality. So I think it’s the best example, that if you ever have a goal, if you ever have something you want to reach, you see it, so you’ll do everything—you will compromise, you will help, to realize this goal. And this goal can be about winning the game, it can be about getting peace, it can be about helping the community. It’s everything you want.

Ritula Shah: Kareem?

Kareem: When I went in 2006, we all wanted to play a prank at Camp, so we decided to turn all the water tanks at Camp—which people drink from—green. We got our hands on some green food coloring. You know, we were all Israelis, Palestinians, Egyptians, Jordanians, Americans, who didn’t care. We were more than likely to get in trouble, which we did because the next day a health inspector came to Camp. But we all had a similar interest in just having fun. No one is born to hate, no one is born with a specific nationality. I’m very proud to be Palestinian, but no one is born to hate.

Ritula Shah: Kareem Uri and Sahar Warshavsky. I’m Ritula Shah, and that’s it for this edition of Outlook.