Back in August I met with a group of Israeli bloggers at a Cafe in Tel Aviv to talk re the OneVoice Summit. One blogger, Dorothy from SavtaDotty, started with some tough questions but eventually not only posted a very positive blog but became a die-hard partner and even ended up spending an afternoon [...]
The OneVoice Gaza office was burglarized last night. At 1:30am, armed guards forced the landlord of our office at gunpoint to open the doors to the OneVoice office in Gaza. They stole two old laptops. Nobody was harmed. At first I tried to assuage my team members and joked that the thieves would be [...]
The first set of sad news for the people of Gaza this last week was that Hamas again violently suppressed the popular non-violent protest driven by the people. I had reported a couple weeks ago that the people in Gaza were self-organizing a day of prayer outside the mosques, as an expression against the hijacking [...]
Here are some pictures I just got from Mowaffaq Alami, OV Gaza’s Executive Director, of training going on for young people in Gaza to build a civic movement against extremism…
On September 11th, I wrote a piece wondering about Bin Laden’s motives. Could he really believe that his actions would make us surrender? But as much as we revile him, we must assume he is calculating and smart. Bin Laden’s goal could not have been to defeat America in one blow or make America retreat [...]
A third particularly insightful and counterintuitive thought that Avraham shared: Arab Israelis increasingly see themselves as Palestinian citizens of Israel and that can be a very good thing for Jewish Israelis. It can help heal Israeli Jewish identity. But it needs a Palestinian culture that can flourish and not be feared, so that Palestinian citizens [...]
Avraham Infeld, the Chairman Emeritus of Hillel, is known as a giant in Jewish circles. My friend, mentor and hero Rabbi Brian Lurie (I’ll tell you about him another time) introduced me to Avraham earlier this summer. I was struck by his passion for Israel, and corollary passion for a Two-State-Solution, with the passion emanating [...]
When fighting nihilistic, authoritarian, repressive, totalitarian and/ or fundamentalist movements or governments, those on the side of freedom need to keep in mind the big picture: no such negative structure has ever withstood the test of time or can compete in a clean race against liberty of thought and expression. Acts of terrorism and sabotage [...]
Tom Friedman has turned into a global icon by taking complex matters, synthesizing them, and explaining them in easily understood sound-bites that everyone can relate to. He is excellent at creating clear contrasting images and analogies to our daily experience. While in the process he often over-simplifies an issue and turns it into pop, this [...]
A YGL from Colombia mentioned at a session here in Dalian that ‘reality changes faster than perception,’ which is a challenge to Colombia because even as vast economic, social and political developments take place, the stereotype about Colombia as a dangerous guerrilla-ridden zone will take far longer to change. The same problem exists in conflict [...]