BY ARTHUR M. HORWITZ | Empathy. Webster’s defines it quite simply: “Intellectual or emotional identification with another.” Yet its absence has been a primary obstacle to peacemaking between Israel and its neighbors.
Israel Prime Minister Ehud Barak’s jump-starting of the meandering Middle East peace process, literally hours after taking office last week, is rooted in the understanding that both Israelis and Palestinians have suffered over the years. By acknowledging the mutual pain, Barak has suddenly put a human face on the enemy.
Similar pronouncements from Yasser Arafat, the chairman of the Palestinian Authority, are also needed to achieve the “peace of the brave” to which they both refer.
Empathy.
Thousands of miles away from their homes, Israeli and Arab teenagers, mostly Palestinians, are learning and living the language of understanding. At a camp in Maine, outside of Portland, Seeds of Peace is providing these teens with a glimpse of the future—one that their generations will help shape.
A group of 165, including a delegation of Turkish and Greek Cypriots, are currently completing a three-and-a-half week session that has changed them from enemies to friends. And it all started with getting beyond their respective “facts” and fears while feeling the other person’s pain.
Seeds of Peace is the brainchild of veteran Hearst newsman John Wallach. Since its inception in 1993, more than 1,000 “seeds” have graduated from the camp, returning to their countries and communities as beacons of conflict resolution. Seeds of Peace is the only people-to-people program that has the blessings of the Israeli, Palestinian, Egyptian, Jordanian and Moroccan governments.
More than 4,000 teens are nominated each year by their governments to be among the 300-350 “seeds” who attend one of the camp’s two sessions. The camping experience is similar to many others on the one hand… pristine lake, sports, arts and crafts and bug juice.
On the other hand, it has daily conflict resolution sessions facilitated by trained staff and carefully planned integration of sports teams, bunks and other camp activities. The universal language of the camp is English.
A group from Detroit, headed by Seeds national board member Joel Jacob and including U.S. Rep. Joseph Knowllenberg, an important Seeds supporter on Capitol Hill, visited the camp last week. What they saw were the possibilities when fear and suspicion are overcome.
The teens stroll the campgrounds in identical, standard-issue green T-shirts. Girls are arm-in-arm with other girls. Boys throw their arms around other boys. Only after meeting them do you realize that they are Jewish girls holding hands with Palestinian girls; Palestinian boys throwing their arms around Jewish boys.
When this group of campers arrived at the camp less than three weeks ago, they were armed with anger, fear and their own set of “facts.” Also, many came following a final orientation from their host governments meant to reinforce their feelings of injustice.
“Freedom fighters” or “terrorists?” Six-million Holocaust victims or 10,000? “You mean I have to sleep in the same bunk with my enemy?”
Within a week, however, the campers begin to listen. And with listening comes empathy and humanity. A bomb in a market is not merely a strike against the Zionist entity. It is the maiming of the friend of a Jewish “seed” who was only looking to buy some food to feed her family.
A vigorous search by a soldier at a border crossing is not just a safety net for catching terrorists, but the humiliation of the grandmother of a Palestinian “seed.”
By sharing and hearing each other’s fears, the young people develop a remarkable bond. While the campers still engage in heated arguments about the final status of Jerusalem or the return of Palestinians from refugee camps, they disagree without being disagreeable and they remain friends.
The model created by Seeds of Peace provides a glimpse of how far the peace process can go. In his inaugural address last week, Israel’s Barak said he is “not only cognizant of the sufferings of my own people, but I also recognize the sufferings of the Palestinian people.”
It all starts with empathy.