JERUSALEM: Traitors to their enemies, heroes to their fans, Israeli soldiers and Palestinian fighters who once fought across the barricades have become the latest groups to promote peace in the Middle East.
Calling themselves Combatants for Peace, dozens of Israelis and Palestinians who once stood on the frontline of one of the most intractable conflicts in the world have seen the error of their ways and today lecture reconciliation.
“Some say you’re killers, what the hell are you doing here in Tel Aviv,” says Osama Abu Karsh, smartly-dressed in fawn corduroys but jailed in Israel for three years as a teenager for fighting in the occupied West Bank.
Refusenik soldiers and reformed militants, they tell their personal stories in villages and universities to preach that violence cannot resolve conflict and that both sides need to act together to end Israeli occupation.
A tall order after nearly 6,000 people have been killed since the second Palestinian uprising erupted six years ago and four decades after Israel first occupied east Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip and West Bank.
“So many of my friends criticise me because I'm trying to change my entire idea about the conflict. They look to this as a crime,” says Ashraf Khader, 28, who once threw Molotov cocktails and stones at Israeli soldiers.
Ninety-five per cent of his Palestinian colleagues were jailed in Israel. Most come from the Fatah party founded by the late Yasser Arafat. There are none from the more radical Islamist factions Hamas or Islamic Jihad.
“We bring them terrorists to their home, as they see it,” admits 30-year-old Avner Wishnitzer who once served in the same crack Israeli commando unit that staged the daring Entebbe rescue mission in the 1970s.
A Ph.D student who became a refusenik after being so horrified by what he saw during the second intifada, Wishnitzer and his Palestinian ‘combatants’ counsel against violence while promoting dialogue and a two-state solution.
Wishnitzer, researching Ottoman history and teaching taekwondo while recovering from cancer, openly confesses his own fear about meeting Palestinian fighters, face to face, for the first time.
“It was scary. It was the height of the intifada and we were meeting members of the Tanzim of Fatah whose members are being killed by the Israelis every day. Possibly we shot at each other as little as six months earlier.” But in a refreshing break from the often grating optimism of other peace pioneers, combatants are reluctant to overplay their potential impact in societies hardened by violence, where conflicting passions are entrenched.
“It’s not like we think we're going to change the world and bring peace to the Middle East. None of us are that naive,” says Wishnitzer.
“Some of us spent nine to 10 years in prison. Sometimes people listen to us. We can’t just be dismissed as another bunch of mainstream lefties. When they see that terrorists have faces some of them re-think some of their ideas.” He was referring to jail terms served by Palestinian colleagues in the group.
Abu Karsh believes that his efforts have been worth it alone for his 13-year-old daughter, who glimpsed a different reality after meeting one of the Israelis.
“Where I live, on a hill overlooking a main road used by (Jewish) settlers, the only way to see Israelis is as settlers, soldiers, killer soldiers and bad Jews.
“It was a confusing meeting for her. Here was an Israeli who could be a friend and a normal human being. It was the first time she realised not all Israelis are killers and settlers. That had a great impact on me.” When Wishnitzer was ill, he says he was “overwhelmed” by how many of his Palestinian co-crusaders came to visit, called or sent emails.
Yet some Palestinian combatants face a long hard mission to get permission to cross into Israel to deliver their lecturers and conduct their meetings, indicative of the price they have to pay for occupation.
Wishnitzer emphasises that as much as he opposes Israeli policy, he believes both sides have a responsibility and talks about trying to convince Palestinians that they have a choice too.
Sitting in a West Bank office far from the bright lights of the trendy Israeli cafe where Wishnitzer made the statement, Abu Karsh thinks about it for a fraction of a second before dismissing the hypothesis out of hand.
“Personally I hold the occupation responsible for everything. The victim cannot be responsible for being a victim. The sheep can’t be responsible for being a sheep so the wolf can eat it.”—AFP
