I lived for two years in Israel. He lives in Jaffa, a few steps from where the American poet Raymond Carver lived. And my daughter, who is almost a child, goes to school with the children of Palestinian poets. Zahiye Kundos and the Colombian writer Antonio Ungar At that time, I premiered a play with Israeli actors, Palestinian musicians, and a Russian stage director.
“I don’t know what’s going on, and I’m running with my baby in my arms under the sirens.”
I planted olive trees in Bethlehem for peace, and the day after I arrived in Tel Aviv while having coffee on Rothschild Boulevard, I heard the air raid alarm sirens for the first time. Everyone was running, and since I could not speak Hebrew at the time, I did not understand what they were saying. They pushed me into the shelter. It was a dark basement, and I didn’t know if an atomic bomb had been dropped on us or if World War III had broken out. I don’t know what happened, and I ran with my baby in my arms under the sirens.
The smell of fear
Nothing happened. No rockets fell on Tel Aviv, but I was able to breathe and smell. When I came down from the shelter, I could smell the fear around me. Sirens sounded all the time. Some people stayed to watch the Iron Dome neutralize the rockets. Since then, when I hear sirens, even fire engines, I remember the smell of fear.
Those bombs (in 2012 and 2014) were not the end nor did they bring peace.”
It was the offensive against Gaza that Hillary Clinton stopped when she was Secretary of State in 2012. Going to the airport, we passed her limousine, which brought peace. But Israel bombed Gaza in retaliation, and those bombs are not the end, nor do they bring peace.
So my stay in Israel began under the bombs. I have heard my grandparents tell the stories of our Civil War many times and thought my generation would never know them. And it ended when, in July 2014, we went out with my son, who is two years older, on the last plane to take off from Israel before they closed the airspace.
under the bombs
I am in Israel among two offensives in Gaza. I went in under the bombs, and I came out under the bombs. We bought the ticket six months before, and even then, we spent almost a day waiting for Ben Gurion Airport, which is an airport in the United States with thousands of people trying to leave the country. Sitting on the floor for hours. Old men and women, mothers, fathers, children… The Spanish Embassy contacts us when evacuation is necessary. This is not necessary.
526 children, less than eight years old, died in that bombing in Gaza. And those deaths did not bring peace either.
“The only way to achieve lasting peace and security for Israel is the path of reconciliation.”
We are all afraid, and we condemn the deaths of innocent Israeli civilians, but, precisely to avoid more deaths, we must make a call for peace, and the only way to achieve lasting peace and security for Israel is on the road to reconciliation.
More than 2,000 children died
As I write, over 2,000 women and men have died. and Your sacrifice will not bring a better world, nor is it safer for Israel or the West. Nor will it lead to the release of the innocent captives of Israel, whose fate no one seems to care about.
“Every bombing and every dead child only brings more violence and more hatred.”
There have been nine bombings in Gaza, and every bombing and every child killed only brings more violence and hatred. Like Amos Oz, I guess lasting peace will bring peace and tranquility to the daily life of Israel.
Today, a million children live in the Gaza Strip. They are deprived of water, light, and electricity, and calling them animals is not a moral thing. and it is not sustainable. The way to violence only leads to more violence in the short and long term.
The death of innocents breeds hatred; hatred breeds fanaticism and Fanaticism brings many deaths of the inngoodwill only way to break this infernal cycle is to stop it.
People of good will
In these times of pain, calls for peace and moderation are not popular. And that’s exactly why we need to do it.
“The greatest threat to peace is the belief that it is impossible.”
The greatest threat to peace is the belief that it is impossible. And peace is not only possible; peace always comes at the end. In a day, in a month, in a year, in a hundred years, history has taught us that wars are argoodwilland that finally, peace came out. There are many, many people of good will.
We will be alone a little, but all together in our social networks, tweeting, and posting for peace, there are millions of us. We use that power by sending the posts of our representatives to the European Union and, above all, to deer. Because they are, can you stop the panic about which the Ukrainian writer Joseph Conrad spoke? The horror we write against
“We can make peace.”
We don’t have wings, but we can fly. We invented the airplane. We don’t have gills, and we can be underwater. We invented the submarine, and we can invent peace. We cannot continue to resolve our conflicts, wars, and massacres like thousands of years ago.
“Let’s create a lasting peace movement. “That would be a greater invention than the wheel.”
We are creative beings. Let’s make a lasting peace movement. That wrevolutionn invention more important than the wheel or spaceships. A real evolution for humanity
Nobody believed in Mahatma Gandhi when, with no violence, he promised independence from Britain. And few will believe me now, but I will tell you that we need a Nelson Mandela in the Middle East, and we have him. Somewhere among the ruins is someone hoping for a way out for the whole region, which is like saying for the whole world.
Intelligence against violence
For all those who don’t want to understand me, I strongly condemn the terrorism of Hamas, but I ask that children and innocent civilians not pay for it.
I condemn violence that only begets violence. I ask for peace and the word.
“There must be a ceasefire, dialogue, and find a negotiated solution.”
The best help that the United States and the European Union can offer at this time is not to help the war but to make the reality that is now possible to many. But not me, who knows many people of good will on both sides. There must be a ceasefire, dialogue, and the search for a negotiated solution so as not to give arguments to the violent and to end the violence possibly: with intelligence.
