The Future is Peace with Aziz Abu Sarah and Maoz Inon (Part 1 of 2)

In this episode of Provoking Peace, hosts from the Sisterhood of Salaam Shalom sit down with Aziz Abu Sarah and Maoz Inon, co-CEOs of InterAct International. As a Palestinian and an Israeli working together, they discuss their shared journey as peacemakers and their upcoming book, The Future is Peace: A Shared Journey Across the Holy Land, set for release on April 14th.

Key Provisions

• The Power of Vulnerability: Both authors emphasize that true healing and reconciliation require being vulnerable and working through personal pain and trauma.
• Brotherhood and Partnership: Their relationship is built on a "brotherhood" that rejects the narrative of being "supposed enemies" in favor of equality and shared action.
• Breaking Ignorance: The book is described as a "hammer" intended to break down walls of ignorance that lead to fear and hatred.
• Shared Humanity: Rather than debating historical facts to "win," they focus on a dialogue that recognizes 50% of the region's population is Israeli and 50% is Palestinian, requiring a joint path forward.

Scope of Work & Compensation

• Peacemaking as a Lifestyle: For Aziz and Maoz, peacemaking is a 24/7 commitment that informs everything they do, including tours, writing op-eds, and leadership.
• Personal Cost of Conflict:
  • Maoz Inon: Lost both of his parents and several childhood friends to the conflict.
  • Aziz Abu Sarah: Lost his brother and has family members separated by exile and different administrative rules in Jerusalem and the West Bank.
• Defining the Nakba: Aziz explains the Nakba (1948) as a "catastrophe" that continues to affect Palestinians today through trauma, displacement, and disconnection from family.

Communication & Compliance

• Intentional Terminology: The duo decided to use equalizing language (e.g., if one says their parents were "killed," the other says their brother was "killed") to ensure their relationship began on level ground.
• Authentic Voice: In writing the book, they allowed interviewees the freedom to use their own terms without censorship to remain faithful to their lived experiences.
• Shared Values over Perfect Agreement: They argue that while people may never agree 100% on the past or specific terms, they must agree on the values and actions needed to fix the future.

Resources

• Book: The Future is Peace: A Shared Journey Across the Holy Land by Aziz Abu Sarah and Maoz Inon (Available April 14th).
• Organization: InterAct International, a non-profit dedicated to Middle East peace.
• Podcast: Provoking Peace by the Sisterhood of Salaam Shalom.

Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:00

Welcome to Provoking Peace, a podcast by the Sisterhood of Salam Shalom, where we bring Muslim and Jewish women and our allies into conversation to explore what it really takes to build peace in ourselves, our communities, and our world.

SPEAKER_02 0:17

We go beyond the headlines to speak with people who are living this work every day. Activists, educators, artists, fake leaders, and more.

SPEAKER_04 0:28

We're here to ask bold questions, listen deeply, and invite you to join us in disrupting assumptions and stereotypes. One Muslim and one Jewish woman at a time. So we're honored today to have with us Aziz Abusara and Mao Zinan, co-CEOs of Interact International and a nonprofit dedicated to Middle East peace. And two incredible peace builders and peacemakers, and we're just so, so happy to have you with us today.

SPEAKER_00 1:08

Thank you. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_02 1:10

And they're also the co-authors of a new book. It's coming out April 14th, and it's called The Future is Peace, A Shared Journey Across the Holy Land. And you can buy it for pre-order wherever books are sold. And we've been so lucky enough to have read it, and it was really fantastic. So we're so happy to have you here today.

SPEAKER_03 1:29

Thank you. It's a pleasure.

SPEAKER_02 1:31

For those who have not been lucky enough to read your book so far, um, or to see you on uh you know the news or social media, how would you introduce yourself to someone that you're meeting for the first time?

SPEAKER_03 1:45

So okay, usually we have a like a rule that I'm starting, but you can name anyone else, okay? And they usually definitely when we we do it on stage or public uh uh venues, we start with a hug. It's give us uh the power of each other and of humanity that they are here with us. So as is I'm sending you a hug.

SPEAKER_00 2:11

Got it, received.

SPEAKER_03 2:13

Yes, and likewise. So many people now do ask me, even neighbors or people I know, or family members that or or new uh um new contact, what do I do? So I'm making peace. I'm I'm a I'm a peacemaker, that's what I do 24-7, and I was I I am fortunate to have the most amazing partner, Azizabusara, whom I learned so much from.

SPEAKER_00 2:42

Thank you. Yeah, I think we both uh identify uh similarly. We are peacemakers first and foremost. Both of us have worked in many other things as well. Work worked in many other things as well, but peacemaking is a primary thing. I think the thing about peacemaking, when you work in peacemaking, it can transform anything else you do. Whether Moaz and I lead a tour together, we're still doing it for peacemaking. Whether we're writing op-eds, we're still doing it for peacemaking. Whether we're writing a book, we're doing it for peacemaking. So that the concept of peacemaking isn't only for us to sit and have dialogue with each other, but it's also an outwardly concept where you take what you learn and you spread it in every tool possible and you make it part of every existing thing in the world.

SPEAKER_04 3:32

Thank you. That that's beautiful. We'll definitely go deeper on that. What does it mean to be a peacemaker or peace builder? But I just wanted to reflect reading your book. Congratulations, by the way. That that an incredible, uh, I feel like uh that they could they can easily be three books in there. But you really shared a lot of, it's full of information, a lot of emotion, and a lot of vulnerability. And I am I'm very, very impressed and and happy that it had it was that way because you're really opening the doors for many to do the same and experience it fully. So, my question to you um would be was writing this book in a way a healing process as well for both of you as you were writing it?

SPEAKER_03 4:22

I I will start because I was also also preparing myself to the podcast, and what would I answer to this question? And so it's a big yes. I lost my parents only uh two years and a few months ago, and I was like, it's the worst strategy anyone can imagine, cannot imagine. It's the worst nightmare. Anyone think he will be trapped within. And for me, it became reality in my life to losing both my parents, so many of my childhood friends, their parents, their children. Uh and also I have many Palestinian friends. Many of them lost family, many family members in Gaza. And I have Palestinian friends in the West Bank that are suffering from the occupation, separation, and ethnic cleansing. So our reality is broken. But through the brotherhood, and it's a brotherhood, what then it's a shared journey across the Holy Land that's from two people that were supposed to be enemies, hate each other, uh be fearful from each other, want to revenge in each other. This book is a healing process. And through this book and many of the other things we are doing, like as is said in the beginning, everything we are doing is peace-oriented, and and we start making peace between our nation and our people. So it's a healing process for me. And you cannot heal yourself if you are not vulnerable, if you are not uh walking with your pain, with your trauma, recognize it, share it with others and and be open to the world. Because if you just want to shelter yourself, then we already we are proving in the book that no shelter can actually bring security, no shelter can defend, no wall as high as it is, can defend. And that's what history proven. That's what we are proving in the book, in our shared journey, that the only way for healing, true healing, is dialogue, is reconciliation, and it's partnership.

SPEAKER_00 6:42

I would say pretty much the the same thing. I agree, I agree with everything Mao said. Uh and and the part of about vulnerabilities is very important. I've written two books before, and uh the last one, I talked to a very good friend, uh, and I asked her what she thought of it. And she said it was really good, it was beautiful, tons of stories, but you were not vulnerable. And that was her one criticism of my last book. And so when we came through this journey, I decided that I want to purposefully try to be vulnerable. And as Malos said, it's very hard, being vulnerable is very hard. It's very hard for me. I think it's a little easier for Malos. It's it's very hard for me to be vulnerable. And so part of that's a learning experience, and eventually it is a healing experience because you cannot you cannot tackle something that you're not talking about. And uh, and so as you read through, you will see that we're wrestling with some of these thoughts. And we're not always, I think our goal isn't to always say, we know every answer to every question you have, and the book definitely isn't coming. I I hope it didn't come across that way, but rather to say, here are the questions we wrestle with, here's how we dealing with these emotions, with these issues, with the problems around us, and let's work together to solve it, to fix it. We know that the future is peace. How we get there depends on us. So we wanted to, I guess, tell our story and be honest about it. And then the other thing it did, uh, in the sense of healing, I think relationships is the most important thing in this journey. A lot of people can turn against you for this work. A lot of people might be angry against you. There are people in your country who think you lost your mind for doing peace work. And so having strong partnerships is very important. Having brotherhood, as Mao said, is very important. And the book helped us get to know each other so much better. And, you know, to build a true relationship and true partnership and a true friendship and a true brotherhood. It cannot happen without vulnerability and it cannot happen without spending a lot of time together. There is uh something I quote in the book, Omar ibn al-Khattab, who is a Muslim caliph, and in it he was asked to judge between two people, and he he asked one of them to bring someone to testify to his uh to his uh what you call it, to his character. And when he asked him, do you know this person? And he said, Yes, he said, Have you traveled with him? And he said, No. And he's like, if you have not traveled with somebody, you don't really know them. So this is to me how our relationship has gotten stronger is our travel together and not just travel abroad together, but travel into each other's life.

SPEAKER_04 9:35

That's beautiful. Just uh uh to follow up, I think it what came through to me is that you were kind of getting to know yourselves as you you were getting to know each other, right? It was a uh I think the way I see the peace process, it's like creating your own peace so you can create it for others, right? So doing this is really going through your own experiences so you can you can create that for others, right? That peace for others. And I just want to say it takes a lot of courage to be vulnerable. It's uh it's really one of the bravest things, things one can do.

SPEAKER_03 10:16

I would also share, I I also write in the book that Dor, my second son, he became my political advisor and strategy advisor. And it was in uh uh the dinner table before we uh were doing our TED talk in Vancouver, which we also um uh share in the book. I was opening, I was I asked which vision should I share at the TED stage? The the vision of the tears or the vision of the star. And though said it very clearly, Daddy, you should share the vision of the tears because there you are showing vulnerability, and that's what uh uh uh is needed from you uh nowadays to show your vulnerability and not to show that you are strong and powerful and brave. Show your vulnerability. So that's also a lesson I learned from my son.

SPEAKER_02 11:13

Beautiful, he's very wise. How old is he when he said that?

SPEAKER_03 11:17

Uh he was 16.

unknown 11:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 11:20

But a wise teenager. If you knew his mom, then you won't be surprised.

SPEAKER_02 11:27

I think um humor, to me, humor and vulnerability are the sort of things that kind of can disarm, you know, disarm people, right? So I think, especially when you're having conversations about Israel-Palestine, about history, about things that are very, very personal to a lot of people, and people have very strong feelings about it. That ability that you both have in in your speaking and clearly in your book to be to be funny and to be vulnerable, I think can kind of disarm some of that sort of um, you know, uh instinctual feelings of kind of protection and like a wall that people have when they're sort of thinking and learning about this. So um I think that your book does a really beautiful job of kind of coming at it from that angle, of sort of letting the reader sort of let down their own walls through your vulnerability um and and listen to you with open hearts. And it was really beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 12:23

Aziz is the funny. Aziz can be I'm showing my vulnerability and Aziz make the laugh.

SPEAKER_01 12:33

That's great. Maybe in another half an hour you'll be like, okay, now I'm now I got it.

SPEAKER_00 12:42

The moment I drink more tea as as my cup of tea goes down, I'll get the relationship.

SPEAKER_02 12:52

Um I did sort of reading about reading the book and thinking about your your kind of different childhoods in the same region, but very, very different. As an American Jew, um, I grew up um never hearing the term Nakba, um, not really, you know, sort of understanding the true history of the region. You know, the the the sort of phrase that we grew up with, which I'm sure you've heard a million times, is a um a people for uh for a people without a land for a land without people, which is clearly not true, but is what sort of we we were taught uh growing up, and is something that I've had to really unlearn, and that a lot of people that I know are the same. Is and so I I was wondering sort of what as you were growing up, uh Mao specifically, and then of course we'll talk to Aziz as well, how is that did you have a similar kind of sense? I know that your your family were very strong in the Zionist movement, and what what did you know about the history um of your land and have are there things that you've had to unlearn as well?

SPEAKER_03 14:01

So we use the same this same quote also in the book. And this, if people will need will ask me what was the narrative or the the frame within you were raised and educated, so that will be the one. People with no land that came to a land with no people. And my parents, grandparents weren't strong within the Zionist movement, they were the movement. They were the movement, they were the young Eastern European Jews that suffered from programs and feeling their earth starts shaking beneath them with the rise of the uh Nazi uh uh regime in Germany, and they had a huge dream to build a safe and secure homeland to the Jewish people after two uh two thousand years in exile. And that's how they came in the early 30s. And uh in the book, we are able to twine both narratives, and Aziz's narrative and my narrative, the Palestinian and the uh Zionism, not as a competing narrative, but as two truth that Aziz was raised upon one and I was raised upon the other, and we are not competing, we are not arguing, we are not debating, we are saying yes, we were I was raised in total ignorance of the other. I didn't know where the the differences between Idel Adha, Idl Fiter, and Ramadan, where Jesus was born, where he's buried, and never heard about the annunciation. And this ignorance is leading uh to fear. And when you are fearful, it's much easier to be hateful. And when we are hateful, we can do horrible things to each other. And so we the book, and I'm using Aziz word from the book, is a hammer. Is the hammer to break those walls of ignorance, walls of ignorance, and start to look in each other in the eye. So it's not a it's it's a dialogue, it's not a debate. Okay, it's not a it's a dialogue that each one of us learning about the other, but most important, learning about oneself. And that's what a good journey, what what an amazing journey can do to you. It changes once it changed who you think about yourself, but it also can change what you think about humanity. And I do believe that all everyone that will read our book will experience a change from the inside and also would learn much more about humanity. And so this is the the goal, the mission, and and what we want to achieve in the book. Not just to know about history, yes, there is a lot of history, but it is more about where humanity can choose to go from this dark time.

SPEAKER_02 17:03

As you uh have sort of learned more about yourself and kind of um made this transition, how did it feel to have such a uh a different view from your grandparents? Like, was it was it difficult for you to sort of make that transition and still think of them with all of the love that you would have in your heart, even though you might have very different views from them now? Or, you know, I'm not trying to put words in your mouth, but I was just curious what that journey was was like for you and your your feelings and memories.

SPEAKER_03 17:38

I love my uh loving grandparents and supporting and adorable and pioneering and brave and courageous. But they also made mistakes, like we all do mistakes. And my my grandparents, after fulfilling their dream, they didn't uh started a new dream. So they didn't cultivate a new dream, and they never tried to reconcile with the Palestinian people, they ignored the Palestinian suffering, pain, tragedy, totally ignored it. And we are when someone is ignoring his partner that we share the land, because as we say, we prove in the book, 50% of the people living in the region nowadays are Palestinian and 50 are Israelis. So if we are totally ignorant to the pain, the suffering, the trauma of the one that you share the land with, then you're gonna pay the price. And they didn't imagine that my grandparents didn't I believe they died many years ago, but they could not imagine that my parents will pay this price. But now I'm not here to, it's not a blame game. I'm not here to blame them, I'm not here, it's not relevant, they cannot be accountable, and we cannot put justice into the past. Now we must work together, Israelis and Palestinians, to create a different future. And like we prove in the book, there is only one possible future, and the future is peace.

SPEAKER_04 19:04

So I'm gonna just uh thank you, Maoz. That that's uh beautifully said, and I love your uh comment about you know, when you accomplish one dream to start creating a new one because it's for new generations and new circumstances. That's beautifully put, really. Aziz, could you tell us a little bit about the impact that Nakbah had on your family and your friends and your family, but your family mainly? And also, I want to take it a little bit further and kind of recognize something you even speak about in the book that the trauma, traumatic experience of Palestinians is really not over, right? So the Nagbah still lives in diaspora in in refugee camps, so it continues. Can you tell us a little bit about, and maybe just for those who are not familiar with Nakbah, just tell us briefly what it is?

SPEAKER_00 19:57

Nakbah is is the word we use for 1948, which the best maybe English translation for it is the word catastrophe. And we had multiple of those, so we had to find another word uh for it. So we have Nakbah is how we use 1948, then we have Nakza, which is the disappointment. I think it's as bad as 1948 for most uh for most Palestinians and so on every every few uh few years. How it has affected, I think my family, other my family are from East Jerusalem and the West Bank. So the Nakba itself affected us in that we became under the Jordanian rule. Uh my family before 1948 had moved, already a while before, had moved from Hebron to Jerusalem, like many people, and that was partially because of the Jewish migration uh to Jerusalem. Uh so you had a lot of families. Still today, if you look at Jerusalem, it's heavily from families who about 100 years ago migrated to Jerusalem. But our biggest effect on a family wise was actually in 1967, because we were living under Jordanian rule and we became under Israeli rule. Half of our family ended up in exile. So my uncle, my dad's cousins, so on, they ended up in Jordan mostly. And for many years they were not even able to come to visit. So I have many cousins who I barely know because they they live in a in a different country. I think that's more the effect it has had on us, and that maybe answers your question. How does it still affect you? 1948 was one example, and for many Palestinians, the Nakba's still happening because the effect of it is still happening. I read, and this is I cannot verify this yet, but I read it from a Palestinian journalist friend of mine from Gaza saying, those who left Gaza before. 7th of October, have been told at the moment at least, even if the borders are opening in the Rafah Crossing, they're not allowed to go back. And the first comment he put is like Nakba 2026. And that's the memory it lives on for many people. It's the trauma, it's the disconnection between families. It's uh, you know, for many actually, for many Palestinians in the in Israel who are Israeli citizens, between 1948 and 1967, they had cousins, brothers, families in Lebanon, in Jordan, in uh in the West Bank, in Egypt, in Gaza, that they had zero connection with. And that disconnect has definitely impacted people. And I think it's maybe the worst that has impacted us is now you have Palestinians who are Gaza Palestinians, West Bank Palestinians, Jerusalem Palestinians, uh Diaspora Palestinians in Europe, diaspora in America, diaspora in the Arab world. And none of us really can meet in in many situations. It's it's very hard for us uh to get together.

SPEAKER_04 23:08

Thank you for sharing that. That's uh and I know that that that issue is one of the most painful things that Palestinians usually usually bring up in relation to um making the future uh in the land. So yes. Ellie.

SPEAKER_02 23:25

Yeah, so we one of the things that we noticed in your book that you were very, very intentional about and you spoke about in the beginning is the use of language, um, the as as the use of specific words and phrases that sometimes you know can can be can be triggering, you know, for others, can be um can cause misunderstandings. So could you talk about sort of your decision to use the words that that were meaningful to you and sort of how you kind of how you made that decision and why? Um the sisterhood, you know, is something that that we that we deal with uh a lot um as well when we're talking with each other, that sometimes conversations can kind of flow next to each other, and you're often not like talking to each other because there can be so many misunderstandings. So I was really I loved uh what you said about your terminology. So if you could maybe talk about that and about that decision, um that would be great.

SPEAKER_03 24:21

Maybe I can start with the terminology, uh terminology between Aziz and myself, and then Aziz can speak uh uh maybe more about the book. So when we were when we were preparing to our TED talk, I think it was one of the first meetings, we said, oh, I think it was me, but it's we we are confusing now who said what. So let's assume I say that that Aziz, we need to call what happened to our loved one in the same wording. So if I'm saying my uh parents were killed, you would say my brother was killed. He would say, My parents were murdered, you will say your brother uh was murdered, or if I lost my parents, you lost your brother. Because it's so obvious, it's so uh it is still painful that in some places when uh in the introduction it's the presenter or the host, he would say definitely if it's in the US, Mawa's parents uh were murdered on October 7th, and Aziz lost his his brother. So there is no equality. So if you're starting from a different uh different places, you it's much more difficult to meet in the future. So we decided that our relationship from day one will be based on equality, if it's in the term we're using for the most difficult and and painful uh aspects of our of our pain and our past, and of course, if it's uh towards the uh when you start talking about the future. So when you it's becoming a nature, and we are modeling that equality is possible. We are modeling that we can uh keep on discussing and talking and partner and be brothers, even if we don't agree on some specific words or or histories or even what for others will be facts. So it's it it's uh and it's that many times we it's again that it's a dialogue meeting, it's not a debate. So we are not here to win a debate about this word or this term or the other, because many times we do win the debate. Okay, and the word we wanted to push, that's the word that okay, everyone agreed. That's the word I will gonna describe what happened in Gaza, what happened in 48, or what happened to Aziz brother or my parents. But as we win the debate and the argument, we are losing life. As we speak now, life was lost in Gaza. Another uh family were displaced in the West Bank. And so let's focus on fixing the future and the reality and not winning the argument. So that's it's a big philosophy for a small for one question.

SPEAKER_00 27:17

I think the goal we had is each of us can also use terminologies that the other might or might not agree with. And then when we interviewed people, we told people they're free to use the terminologies they want, and that we will not change that terminology, even if we don't agree with or if we do agree with. And that's important. So the the language was fluid in the book. It can go back and forth. And I hope people, as they read it, they see that we allowed the freedom for each other and for those we interviewed to say what they really felt without censoring what they said. Because one of the worst things, as Mao said, when even when I remember writing an op-ed for a major news outlet in the States, and I wrote about what happened to my brother, and in my op-d I wrote, my brother was killed, and they decided to change it. And they said his brother died of mistreatment. Completely changed my article and never even asked me and published it. And so I felt very betrayed by that. And so we wanted to make sure this is not what we do as we're talking to to people and being faithful to what they said as well. I think we should not be changing people's words. And for us, we don't have to agree on everything. I think the problem today, especially among people on the left in some ways, we have to agree on 100% of everything for us to do something together. And if like no two people agree on everything, I think what we have to agree on is where we're heading and what's the actions we got to do. And if we agree on the actions, we agree on the values, we agree on where we're going, we might not ever agree in the past, we might not ever agree on terminologies. And there are times we can debate those things, and there are times it can go to a longer discussion. At the moment, if we agreeing on an action together, to me, that's the most important.

SPEAKER_04 29:22

Wow, you both shared so much. I I kind of want to uh uh go piece by piece in everything you shared. And and you're right, Maos, that this is a deep philosophy that is very hard in any peace building and dialogue and and uh coalition building work. So I just want to say a couple of things. Uh, what you were describing is that the sisterhood has been using this um method that we come into conversation with using terminology that we feel best describes what we see. However, speaking from eye perspective, right, describe and describing what that means to me, right? Why is it why is it that I see that way? What and not that I'm defining something as such, but I'm bringing this into conversation to tell my story, to explain my experience. And that helped us a lot in uh having these deep conversations. I want to come back to this, but one thing that you both mentioned, I and this is a whole different conversation, is I feel like you're addressing two parts of your lives. One is public, one is private conversation. So public conversation addresses media's biases that we've been living with for decades. So I really am so uh happy you're working on that because it is painful to hear, you know, you know, giving a full name and saying they were murdered or killed, and then another 20 were disappeared, or you know, so there's that discrepancy and and uh disharmony in what media does. So I'm glad you're addressing that. I just want to go back to uh one word that we struggled and struggle still with within the sisterhood and here in the US is the word genocide.

SPEAKER_03 31:16

I'm laughing because this world has been hanging around this uh podcast for the last five minutes.

SPEAKER_04 31:22

So no, no, it's been hanging for for a long time, right?

SPEAKER_03 31:26

It's a best in our conversation for five minutes.

SPEAKER_04 31:29

Then absolutely. No, if we do we do talk about other, you know, people, if you if you're talking about, like if you're mentioning Zionism, explain what Zionism means to you, right? So all the all these things that might be, but genocide, I'll I'll just bring a little bit of my own vulnerability into conversation. I'm Bosnian. And for me, from very early on, that what was what started happening late 23 and early 24 was a genocide and is a genocide, right? So I had no qualms about uh calling it for what it is, as someone who lived through such experience. And uh we still are struggling with, you know, uh recognize, and I know we I talk to my Jewish sisters a lot, and that that word brings so much pain for so many reasons. So I'm wondering if you can reflect a little bit on where we are going with some of these terminologies that have direct impact on how we uh work on the future of two peoples, right? Um, and I'm speaking again from a personal perspective, because you know, a lot of women of Srebrenica say, you know, we feel like our family, our sons and fathers and brothers were killed once, uh killed twice, once when they were murdered, and second time when genocide was denied. So um it it it has a it has a weight on how the recognition of what has been happening brings healing and brings people together. We have examples of Rwanda, we have other examples where the recognition of this helps people move forward. So I I had to give a little bit of my own perspective on this, just to say, as as we in the sisterhood we speak from my perspective. So I'm bringing a little bit of myself in this conversation, but would love to hear from both of you about this particular issue.

SPEAKER_03 33:33

I will start, if it's okay, with a personal story.

unknown 33:37

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 33:37

That's a very just a few weeks after October 7th, a very good Palestinian friend that knew my parents, knew my family, was in our house, we were in their house, she was like a sister. And then a few weeks after we sit for coffee and she tells me, Maos, I want to share, tale, ask you something. It's a yes, of course. And she's saying, I think your parents weren't killed by the Hamas. I think it was a misfire uh from the Israeli side, like they've done in other places, and that also was in the news. In some communities, it was the IDF that was uh uh causing the death of Israeli uh civilians. So, in this question, she completely denied my story, my personal story. I'm not talking about our people, our nation, my personal story that was allowing me to sleep and cry during the night. And it was like like a punch in my stomach. I couldn't breathe. I she took my like I was shocked, and it took me maybe 30 seconds to to be able to uh realize what was just happening. Like my best friend, my best Palestinian friend is denying, totally denying my own personal story. What might happen to my parents? And when I start breathing again, I ask her, what does it matter? What does it matter? My parents are dead. Can we agree on that? Of course. So I'm not here to play the blame game, I'm not here to say who starts who's accountable. I don't care about it. What I care the most is that we start building a shared future. And so I'm not gonna start arguing, I want you to be my sister, and I want you to partner with me to build this shared future for both Israelis and Palestinians. Would you want, would you like to partner with me? And she said, of course. So it needs, so what does it matter? Still, we won't be able to make justice into the past. It doesn't matter if what happened in Gaza is a genocide or a war of destruction or revenge or a catastrophe or an or the second or third Nagba, it's not gonna bring any soul, any human being back to life. So I'm saying let's give the historian and the national, uh, those who deal with national law and court to define what happened in Gaza in terms of terminology, and let's us, those who are still alive, let's create a shared future for both people. So that's my answer. And and this is one of the biggest compromises. Each one of us, as individual, in the sisterhood or in humanity, definitely, or if we are Palestinian-Israelis, do we want to continue to fight, argue, and debate over the past? And how we're gonna name it, or do we want to jump into the future? And what we show in the book that jumping into the future doesn't mean we are uh uh ignoring our pain, our suffering, our loss. The contrary, we use them to motivate us to create a dialogue with those who are supposed to be our enemies and to with them to build and forge a brotherhood that will build a future we all deserve to live within.

SPEAKER_02 37:04

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SPEAKER_04 37:29

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