BY JAMES D. BESSER | It’s been a long, hot summer of death and despair in the Middle East. But small, quiet efforts at personal diplomacy continue—lost in the static of bad news, but inching forward nonetheless.
In rural Maine and in the shadow of the Capitol, young people representing both sides of the conflict have spent the summer learning about each other as people, not just as ciphers in the battering emotional drama of the Middle East.
Sometimes, proponents of this “track two” diplomacy seem hopelessly naïve—as if a handful of personal rapprochements could somehow undo the clash of entire cultures and the actions of leaders who see nothing but danger in compromise.
Still, they are planting seeds of hope that, properly nurtured, could begin to undo animosities passed on from generation to generation.
This week, 163 teenagers from seven countries, mostly in the Middle East, were in Washington for the windup of the Seeds of Peace camp in Maine.
The campers received anything but the typical tourist treatment; on their schedule were White House sessions and a meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.
The experiment in small-scale diplomacy grew out of the frustration of newspaperman John Wallach with his role as a mere observer of the Middle East conflict.
The result was a camp in the Maine woods that brought kids from the region together for an intensive interpersonal experience. This year, after four years in borrowed quarters, the camp moved into permanent facilities in Otisfield, Maine.
Unity Out Of Tragedy
The session was well under way when the July 30 suicide bombs devastated the Mahane Yehuda market in Jerusalem, a trauma that demonstrated the ability of the camp to reach across generations-old barriers of distrust.
“After the bombing, I called an emergency meeting of the whole camp,” Mr. Wallach said. “At first the Israeli kids retreated into their own delegation in the big hall, among their friends, hugging and crying, some hysterically. Then something spontaneous happened: at least half of the Arab kids, two-thirds of the Palestinians, many with tears in their eyes, said, ‘It wasn’t us; we are your friends; we condemn what happened.’ The two groups then moved from their isolation into each other’s arms.”
Seeds of Peace sessions are always intense—part political debate, part encounter group. This year’s collapse of the peace process and the bitter recriminations on both sides of the conflict, Mr. Wallach said, added still more intensity.
“The political differences are wider than ever. There is the climate of confrontation in the region that made the political discussions here far more difficult,” he said. “But in the end, that also helped create a catharsis and a sense of community we’ve never seen before; they’re closer, almost as if they had to do that to overcome the political obstacles.”
Mr. Wallach is painfully realistic about the impact of his tiny experiment in citizen diplomacy.
“If there’s going to be war, it doesn’t matter what we do; the kids are going to be killing each other,” he said. “But if the peace process continues in some form, somebody has to do the job of preparing the next generation to make peace in their hearts. They’ll all go home changed; that much we know.”
Interning in Understanding
In Washington, a different kind of coming together has been under way all summer.
Jonathan Kessler, who ran the widely emulated college program at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and now works as executive director of the Middle East Insight Policy Forum, brought together Jewish and Arab-American student interns working in Washington.
In the first session, the official White House liaisons to the two communities spoke to the interns, the first time the two had appeared together. At the White House, one of the leading architects of the Clinton administration’s Mideast policy took rapid-fire questions from the well-informed kids.
“All told, we reached more than 150 students,” Mr. Kessler said of the interns, many of whom work for advocacy groups with a stake in the Mideast conflict. “We had a steady core of 45-50 who made it to at least four of the sessions.”
The interns, he said, clearly wanted to explore the issues and make personal connections with kids on the other side of the Mideast divide.
“From the beginning, there were relationships. People stayed behind talking, arguing, then speaking in more moderate terms. They exchanged phone numbers, began to see each other socially.”
Mr. Kessler doesn’t expect his sessions in Washington to affect the course of negotiations in the Middle East, but he does believe they could have a ripple effect that will begin to change the way people view the conflict.
“These students are virtually all interested in pursuing careers in politics, public policy or Mideast affairs,” he said. “They’re opinion leaders; many will go back to their communities and replicate what we’ve done here.”
Indeed a pair of interns—one at the Arab-American Institute, the other at AIPAC—are working with Mr. Kessler to set up a similar program in Boston, where both go to school.
“We touched people who will go back to scores of campuses, communities and countries with one simple message; it is possible to build bridges to the other side,” Mr. Kessler said. “And it’s not only possible, it’s essential. A subterranean people-to-people peace process is under way on both sides of the ocean. It’s a significant investment in the next generation of activists.”
Or, as John Wallach put it from his cabin in Maine: “You have a movement here, and it inspires hope in a world that’s full of despair.”