Daniel Lubetzky

[Ahmad Salameh used to be a student representative of Hamas while at Al Najar University.  During a jail term, he lost his fiance and he started becoming increasingly disenchanted with false promises of glory, eventually turning a new leaf, switching to Bir Zeit University, and joining OneVoice. He was a great activist at OV, until he opted to move to Dubai in search of job opportunities.  In between he was also a very creative entrepreneur, and created a business where messages of love and peace would be graffitied into the separation wall - for a $20 fee per message, which you could request via internet.  We recently corresponded and he permitted me to share his message.]

From: Ahmad Salameh
Sent: Monday, November 19, 2007 11:51 AM
To: Danieel
Subject: Dear

Dear Danieel:
how are you? how is everything wiith you???
i hope that you still remeber me as i do!
i’m in Dubai since last october! iam working in real state ! as a broker in [____] development!!!
if you wana too invest just mail me:-)
in all cases realy iam shocked from the first day that i arrived Dubai!!! most of people dont know anything about the conflict between Palestinian and Israelies!!!
i visted many universities and talk about the conflict and peace horizon!!
iam do care about what will happen after anabolies!! i hope they will success in the conference!
really iam thinking to go back to palestine to support all peace forces!! i think we are in a critical time that will design our future!!
nice to send to you my dear
Ahmad Salameh

One of my replies:

From: daniel
To: salameh.ahmad@
Subject: RE: Dear
Date: Mon, 19 Nov 2007 12:18:43 -0500

Ahmad, it is so nice to hear from you.  I have never been to Dubai but hear it is amazing.  One day I will visit. I hope you do go back to Palestine because we need your leadership and creativity and entrepreneurial spirit to get Palestine to grow.  I send you a big hug and please stay in touch.  Warmest, Daniel

One of his replies:

Thanks alot for your trust my frined but you know in palestine it is very hard to find a job! i spent many years as a voulnteer fpr peace and iam so happy to do that! BUT now after finishing the school i have to work to help my family and my self! you know life expences is too much!
I do care about the situation in palestine i think everybody has to support Mr.Abbas at this time! and we have to say END the war and give us the right to live in peace!
every time i add comments to internet articles spically Hamas websites and i say " please give your eyes the right to see the truthm please give your hearts the right to love, please giveyour souls the right to accept each others, please give OUR childrens the right to live in a peacfull futur!"
most times they ignore my comments but iam sure that every body responsible to tell the truth and to motivate all extreems to think twice before pushing all of us to the hill!!
Ahmad Salameh

"When things go wrong as they sometimes will;
When the road you’re trudging seems all uphill;
When the funds are low, and the debts are high
And you want to smile, but have to sigh;
When care is pressing you down a bit-
Rest if you must, but do not quit.
Success is failure turned inside out;
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt;
And you can never tell how close you are
It may be near when it seems so far;
So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit-
It’s when things go wrong that you must not quit."

- Unknown

"If you stand up and be counted, from time to time you may get yourself knocked down. But remember this: A man flattened by an opponent can get up again. A man flattened by conformity stays down for good."

— Thomas J. Watson, Jr.

You may not see this on TV, but something huge happened in Gaza over the last couple days. 

Hundreds of thousands of people rallied across the center of Gaza City to commemorate Yasser Arafat’s passing.

AFP/via BBC

The rally was organized by the "National Committee", a group of Palestinian civic leaders, primarily from Fatah but also spreading across other parties and unaffiliated Palestinian luminaries tasked with representing the people.

The few media reports that I’ve seen on this are reporting that 5/7/10 people were killed and many others wounded as the Hamas-led police force opened fire at the crowds that were condemning their coup d’etat.

But the bigger story is that this is the biggest demonstration since Hamas took over Gaza by force, and arguably the biggest demonstration in Gaza ever.

THE PEOPLE ON THE GROUND were shouting "Shiia, Shiaa" against the Hamas forces, openly associating them as peons of the Iranian government.

For days, Hamas had been trying to prevent this mobilization from happening, going to the lengths of blocking out all the bus companies so they could not be rented by organizers to bring in people from the outskirts.

But people drove in their cars, and walked long distances, to make their voices heard.

Checkpoints across Gaza set up by Hamas forces were not able to stop this mobilization.

We had a setback last month when we had to postpone the OneVoice Summit in Jericho intended to send a message of support to President Abbas.

But this time the people of Gaza, hundreds of thousands of them, risked their lives to vote with their feet against militant extremism.

Here are a couple of stories that provide more context on this important development:

AFP: Hamas Kills Six at Arafat Rally in Gaza

IHT: Former Gaza strongman Dahlan says Hamas breakup of rally sign of group’s growing difficulties

AP via BBC

It is interesting to see how society reminisces about its leaders.  The contrast is often striking between how we relate to leaders during their lives and after they’ve passed on, particularly if their passing was not natural.

Yitzhak Rabin was not murdered amidst an environment of unwavering support towards him, as we’d like to think.  He was murdered after years of demonization by extremist groups that called him a traitor and called for his life.

I was blessed to meet Yitzhak Rabin twice, and both times were telling of what he signified.

The first time I "met" him briefly in person was at the lobby of the Tel Aviv Hilton, as he was walking down the steps, in the late fall of 1993, shortly after the Oslo Accords.  I had just graduated from law school and was doing research on a legislative proposal for fostering joint ventures among Arabs and Israelis.

When I saw Rabin in the lobby, walking with just one young guy to his side, I was so excited I ran towards him and waved a thumbs up sign at him from the top of the stairs, screaming out "Prime Minister Rabin, you are awesome."

He looked at me with suspicion and disappointment (bordering on disdain), and waved me off, making a facial expression that could best be translated to "get a life and do something productive."

I actually rather admired that this matter-of-fact leader had no time or patience to play the hero.  He had shit to do.  And he expected others to do their part also.

What is the role of the people?  This is what Rabin said during a Congressional Address in 1994 regarding his negotiations with King Hussein of Jordan:

“Who shapes the face of history – leaders or circumstances? My answer to you is: We all shape the face of history. We, the People. We the farmers behind our plows, the teachers in our classrooms, the doctors saving lives, the scientists at our computers, the workers on the assembly line, the builders on our scaffolds. We, the mothers blinking back tears as our sons are drafted into the army; we, the fathers who stay awake at night worried and anxious for our children’s safety. We, Jews and Arabs. We, Israelis and Jordanians. We, the people, we shape the face of history.”

The second time I met Yitzhak Rabin was at my first World Economic Forum meeting in Jordan, in 1995.  It was the day where different countries in the region host luncheons.  Israel was hosting a lunch, Saudi Arabia was hosting a lunch, Qatar was hosting a lunch, Egypt was hosting a lunch, and so on.  What was striking, and unseen before or hence, was that the Israel lunch was the most popular one, and Arab leaders from across the region were jockeying for a ticket.  It was a sign of the times – tangible prospects that this region would see peace soon, Israel would be integrated in the Middle East business map, as would Palestine, and the world would be a better place.

Less than a week later, while walking into dinner at a hotel in London with my girlfriend, the entire lobby fell silent.  We asked what had happened.  Yitzhak Rabin had been assassinated.

I have to imagine the pain we felt in our gut and in our heart that night must have been akin to the moment when JFK was assassinated.

As I wrote in an entry earlier in the year,  when a friend wondered aloud if Rabin even left a legacy, I agreed it remains to be seen.  And I pointed out it is up to us, the people, to ensure one.

This speech is worth reading. It was the precursor to the Annapolis language that validated OneVoice’s mission.  And it provides a very good framework for where we are coming and where we need to go in order to ensure peace and security for Israel and Palestine.

[Read more →]

This poem is an apt warning to the dangers of political apathy and inaction when someone other than yourself is being persecuted…

First they came for the Communists,
- but I was not a communist so I did not speak out.
Then they came for the Socialists and the Trade Unionists,
- but I was neither, so I did not speak out.
Then they came for the Jews,
- but I was not a Jew so I did not speak out.
Then they came for the Catholics,
- but I was not a Catholic, so I did not speak out.
And when they came for me, there was no one left to speak out for me.

This poem is attributed to Pastor Martin Niemöller (1892–1984) about the inactivity of German intellectuals following the Nazi rise to power and the purging of their chosen targets, group after group.  For more info, take a look at the wikipedia entry here.

The most recent act of leadership by Canada’s legislature came from Dr. Bernard Patry, Vice-Chair of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development, who shared these words at the House of Commons on October 25th:

Mr. Bernard Patry (Pierrefonds—Dollard, Lib.):

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour of informing this House that on October 18, here in Ottawa in front of the Peace Tower, the One Voice Movement‘s Canadian section, which was recently created by University of Ottawa students, organized a multipartite meeting to call for an end to the conflict that has gone on for too long between the Israeli and Palestinian peoples.

OneVoice is an NGO that calls on the leaders of the international community to work steadily and without further delay to find a fair and equitable solution to this conflict. The members of OneVoice have promised to keep going until the only victory that matters to them—the victory of peace, reason and humanity—is fully achieved.

May even more Canadians work actively for peace in the Middle East. That is my fondest wish and the hope of Canadians.

*   *   *

Bernard Patry, Vice-Chair

Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs

and International Development

Here is a not untypical message we got from one of our amazing supporters – a rare amalgam of Christians, Muslims and Jews, Palestinians, Israelis, Americans, Europeans and Mexicans – who grow more loyal and more determined with every attack extremists and absolutists make against the mainstream moderates who want to break the shackles of hatred…

I know you must be feeling a little down after putting so much effort into the Oct. 18 event. You’re entitled to feel a little down, but don’t be down for too long because shit happens and what you are trying to do makes sense; I wanted you to know that even though this hasn’t come off right now, that I want to be very much supportive of your efforts going forward. I thought that maybe this would be a good time to make an additional $10,000 contribution to walk that talk. Feel free to use this money to defray any of the exceptional costs of the cancellation. I just want to help you move through all this stuff and put it behind you so that you can do your important work.

Keep the faith.

Besides the fact that we have no alternative but to get this thing resolved, the other source of energy from which I derive my continued commitment to push to end the conflict in spite of the sobering challenges is the incredible resilience and commitment from ordinary citizens and members of the movement.

Tomorrow at 7pm Jerusalem time, Yahoo will show something not seen before at http://video.yahoo.com/onevoice.

We had to move fast to provide this, given that it was different from our original vision.

A new friend of OneVoice Israel, a filmmaker named Avi, stayed till dawn the night before helping us compile some files, as did the FTP transfer internet company team that had to stay up till 4 am uploading a file.

This reminded me of last January, when Naim stayed up till 5am in the morning to ensure that certain files were ready for the Davos presentation to 1,000 world dignitaries, together with President Abbas, President Peres, Tzipi Livni, and Professor Klaus Schwab.

As we are moving at such fast pace and growing at such fast pace, we often face fast-approaching deadlines and seemingly impossible timetables.  And always ordinary citizens rise up to give the movement a boost.  They always are so committed and energized to do their part – this is the ONLY reason why this movement has mushroomed to 600,000 people and to such influence on the minds of so many – because it can channel the frustrations and energies from the millions who cherish an end to the conflict into some concrete positive steps that bring us closer.