During the Lebanon War in 1982, one of the soldiers who returned
from the front to protest against the war opposite Prime Minister
Begin's office was named Shuki. He told a story about his
experience going into the Ein AI-Hilweh refugee camp outside Sidon,
where his unit was ordered to clear the camp of PLO fighters. Shuki
and his comrades fought their way into the camp, shooting as they
went, taking care not to harm civilians. Suddenly two refugees came
in their direction carrying an object and yelling at the soldiers.
Shuki and his buddies screamed back at them, urg¬ing them to
get out of the way. Since the two men were only about 20 yards
distant, the soldiers could quickly make out that they were
carrying a crate of Pepsi Cola and could decipher their screams as
invitations to have a drink! Shuki later reflected: "If they had
been 200 yards away, we would have shot at them and been glad to
hit them." And he asked: "How far away does a human being have to
be before he becomes a target? How close must he be before we see
he is human?"
Shuki's question is addressed to all of us, but especially to
educators within a conflict situation who wish to prepare the
younger generation for a peaceful future. After decades of
dehumanization, the challenge before parents and teachers today, in
both Israel and Palestine, is to find ways to re-humanize the
former enemy. We need to develop effective pedagogical methods of
confronting the negative stereotypes that have developed•
because of the distance and estrangement between the two
peoples.
Between Education and Catastrophe
At the end of his Outline of History, H.G. Wells wrote: "Human
history has become more and more a race between education and
catastrophe." In light of this observation, it makes sense to ask:
Have our educational sys¬tems helped to perpetuate the
divisions between groups, thereby prepar¬ing the ground for
future catastrophes? Is the focus on left-brain analytic thinking,
at the expense of right-brain imagination and intuition as well as
affect, a reductionistic approach that cripples our capacity for
fresh ideas, for imagining the life-situation of our adversaries,
for being in touch with our feelings and having empathy for the
feelings of others?
Peace-oriented education has to address three aspects of the human
personality. The first is symbolic imagination, which crystallizes
its "knowing" in the form of images, including self-images and
images of the Other. The second is cognitive apprehension and
comprehension, which crystallizes its truths into attitudes, even
elaborate ideologies, often in a dualistic manner seeing competing
realities as mutually exclusive (e.g., Israel/Palestine, or
Judaism/Christianity/Islam). The last is the dimen¬sion of
affect, where strong feelings can harden into conditioned
emotion¬al reflexes. This last is the most difficult challenge
for educators to tackle, but we must confront it head-on or no real
healing of psychological wounds will take place.
Images
It is well known that all wars are prepared for and sustained by
dehu¬manizing, even demonizing, the adversary: Palestinians
become fanatic terrorists in Israeli eyes, while Israelis are seen
by Palestinians as brutal soldiers or aggressive settlers. At the
same time, of course, self-images tend to be reduced to that of
victims threatened by the cruel enemy. Sam Keen's powerful TV
documentary, Faces of the Enemy, aired on public television in the
US some years ago, is the best audiovisual presentation I know of
this universal problem. This video would be an excellent
educational tool in both Israeli and Palestinian secondary schools.
There really is no substitute for direct encounter with the former
"enemy" in order to rehumanize that whole group or nation. But
short of that (and it will take time for the two education
ministries to sponsor student exchanges), film and video offer the
potential of presenting the Other's reality in a non-threatening
way, at some distance.
Another 65 half-hour programs of Sesame Street will be co-produced
by Israeli and Palestinian teams - this is a great breakthrough,
since the mass media, especially television, play such a decisive
role in contempo¬rary cultures everywhere. I think other
technologies - computer games, CD-ROM programs - could and should
be used to appeal to youth as they struggle to develop their own
self-images and images of the Other. (I say this, knowing that
Israeli homes and schools have more resources to invest in these
technologies; but over time, Palestinian schools will have to
incorporate them too.) Eventually these "safer" confrontations with
the Other can be made more genuine through carefully planned and
facilitat¬ed encounters with peers from the other side. There
are many personal stories like Shuki's, demonstrating that one
direct experience can alter one's projected negative image of the
Other for good, replacing it with a multiplicity of images
reflecting the human spectrum in any society. If we talk about
informal education for adults, seminars could be organized to
explore the consequences of holding on to the negative stereotypes
of the Other side (with or without encounters with that
dehu¬manized adversary). It may even be possible, with the
proper guidance and support, for participants to attain the insight
expressed at the begin¬ning of this century by the Irish poet,
George William Russell (pen name A.E.): "By intensity of hatred,
nations create in themselves the characters they imagine in their
enemies. Hence it is that all passionate conflicts result in the
interchange of characteristics."
Attitudes
In a conflict between two nations, each with a passionate loyalty
to the same homeland and to its threatened identity, the cognitive
dichotomy of Us vs. Them, perceiving the conflict as zero-sum game,
is a natural out¬come. Nationalisms are, by nature,
self-referencing and self-glorifying; and in a clash between two
different nationalisms, recognition of the rela¬tive justice
on the enemy's side is exceedingly rare. If and when such a
bi¬focal perception is witnessed to, the reaction of the
majority is usually harsh, branding such views as disloyal and
traitorous. Instead, "consensus ideologies" prevail as the
intellectual rationales for the militant struggle: "Judaism is a
blessed religion from God, whereas Zionism is a corruption of true
Judaism and a curse for us Palestinians"; or "There is no such
thing as a Palestinian nation; the Arabs of the Land of Israel are
entitled to rights as individuals but not as a nation." What is
evident to an outsider as two double standards of justice, are
maintained by the warring parties with a fierce determination to
reject any facts that may contradict these self-justifying claims.
For to truly listen to the other side's version of truth and
justice, is felt to be threatening to the very core of one's own
identity, as it has evolved over the course of the national
struggle.
To overcome these conditioned "ideological reflexes," simulation
exercis¬es and (in mixed encounters) role reversals can be
helpful, if facilitated by trained, sensitive group leaders. Common
ground between the adver¬saries can be defined and explored,
and the level of empathy could even reach the point where
participants on both sides can say, "If I were one of them, I would
probably be fighting me, too."
Feelings
Affective education is something that most schools avoid like the
plague: "We'll leave that for the home or the
church/synagogue/mosque." A very high price is paid by this
renunciation of responsibility, which derives from the Western
rationalist paradigm underlying our educational sys¬tem.
Left-brain analytical thinking is rewarded, while artistic or
emotion¬al expressions of truth are generally not. The
question is whether schools, or other educational institutions, can
sponsor experiences that aim at a cathartic transformation of the
emotional matrix at the core of the conflict, on the individual as
well as collective level. How can we transform fear to trust,
especially in a situation of ongoing insecurity? How do we help
peo¬ple work through their feelings of anger, even rage, to
the point where they can forgive the other side and ask for
forgiveness in return? How can people, crippled by grief, be helped
to extend that emotional response to include compassion for the
suffering on the other side, too?
To me these are the essential challenges facing the parents and
educa¬tors of today and tomorrow. Religious educators,
artists, psychologists, and social workers can be enlisted to help
with this therapeutic process on both sides, either within the
framework of public schools or some parallel setting. Teenagers and
adults could be encouraged to use different artistic media to
convey their feelings about themselves, the "enemy," and the
prospects for peace and reconciliation. Imaginary dialogues with
the "enemy" could be structured in group settings, so that
participants receive feedback as well as support for courageous,
iconoclastic viewpoints. Within those simulated encounters,
conducted on each side without the presence of the Other,
participants can be helped to express confessional truth, not only
about their own suffering at the hands of the other side, but also
about the harm caused the other side by one's own people. Later,
when the now-rehumanized adversary is encountered face to face, the
emotional foundation for a respectful dialogue will have been
laid.
Transcending Tragic Histories
In general, once people can grasp and feel through both sides of
the c0ll:' discerning the best and the worst in both parties to the
conflict rather than resorting to generalized stereotypes, then the
rest of the educational task (filling in the gaps in historical and
cultural knowledge) is made much eas¬ier, since the
resistances to this broader, more inclusive, awareness are
considerably reduced. What we all need is to balance the intensity
of passion with a large dose of compassion. While the war is
raging, this is an exceedingly difficult goal. But in an era of
peace, we have the first opportunity to transform images, attitudes
and feelings in the service of genuine coexistence.
I would like to end with a statement from Thich Nhat Hanh, a
Vietnamese Buddhist monk and peace activist. What he says is
relevant not only to Jews and Palestinians, but also to those
caring individuals from outside the conflict who wish to help us
transcend our tragic histories:
To reconcile conflicting parties, we must have the ability to
under¬stand the suffering of both sides. If we take sides, it
is impossible to do the work of reconciliation. And human beings
want to take sides. That is why the situation gets worse and worse.
Are there people who are still available to both sides? They need
not do much. They need only one thing: go to one side and tell all
about the suf¬fering endured by the other side, and go to the
other side and tell all about the suffering endured by this side.
That is our chance for peace. That can change the situation. But
how many of us are able to do that?