Some Thoughts at the Kikar (the Square)

Saturday night, I and about 150,000 other fellow Israelis, took part in a rally to mark thirty years since the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin. The rally was held at the spot where the assassination took place. The surrounding streets, and Kikar Yitzhak Rabin itself, overflowed with people, young and old. Many who were at the Kikar the night of the assassination, but many that were not yet born on that night, for whom the Oslo Accords are not a memory, but something learned in history lessons.

Excellent speeches interspersed with musical interludes and archival video of Rabin “talking” to the crowd, made for a somber but uplifting memorial.

One of the themes expressed was the need to bring the word “Peace” back into the public lexicon as a legitimate topic. The need for hope. If not attainable immediately, Peace is still a worthy goal to work towards.

Miri Aloni, who on that fateful night thirty years ago, sang “Shir LeShalom” (A Song to Peace) on the main stage of the Kikar only moments before Rabin descended a flight of stairs to his death, graced us with a rendition of the song, a strident call for peace. Some stanzas of the song:

Lift your eyes with hope,
not through gunsights.
Sing a song to love
and not to wars.

Don’t say the day will come—
Bring the day!
Because it is not a dream
And in every square
Let only peace be cheered!

Thirty years later, the ravages of time, have immobilized Miri. She can no longer stand. She sat in a wheelchair at the top of the flight of stairs leading down to the assassination spot and sang of Peace, sang with all her heart and soul.

Somehow, this image of Miri encapsulates for me, the image of Peace in Israel.

Immobilized, confined to a wheelchair, without legs to stand …

A mobilized militant population can think only of an armed struggle: for some, as a necessary evil, a means to defending ourselves in a post October 7 reality; and for many others, as a perpetual state, an end in itself, a nation that will live by the sword in glorious isolation (God willing).

And indeed, how does one “Bring the day!” to this seemingly irresolvable conflict?

Netanyahu is responsible for many disastrous policies. One of his worst has been his policy of strengthening the Hamas as a counter the Palestinian Authority. Divide and rule he reasons, making the conflict easier to “manage”. Two years after the October 7 massacre, he still promotes Hamas interests over those of the Palestinian Authority.

The reason is clear: the Palestinian Authority grew out of the Oslo Accords. It is fundamentally a nationalist-based institution, rooted in the nationalistic PLO. Hamas, at its core, is an extremist-Jihadi religious movement.

If the conflict is a nationalist one, it may eventually be resolved by compromise on both sides. Each nation, for its own survival, conceding some of its territorial demands. But if the conflict is not a nationalist one, but a religious one, no compromise is possible. God does not compromise. Neither Muslim, nor Jewish, religious extremists will give up on their divine rights. Favoring Hamas over the Palestinian Authority ensures that the conflict is framed as an existential religious conflict, thus eliminating any chance for a two-state solution.

So, to “Bring the day!” – we must start by returning the conflict to that of a nationalist struggle, a struggle between two nations. We need to minimize the religious roots of the conflict.

I fear this is counter to what is happening. A return to religion and the growth of religious extremism is a trend both in Jewish and Palestinian society. If one follows what has happened to the Israeli education budget in recent years, this is readily apparent. I suspect that the same has happened on the Palestinian side.

This needs to end. On both sides of the divide, educational funding must be diverted into secular education systems, systems in which fundamental human rights and democratic values are taught (even if alongside the partisan national narrative which no doubt will continue to be part of the curriculum). To the extent that funding continues for religious frameworks, this must be limited to the less toxic brands of religion.

The road to peace in this region will be long. It must start with education. On both sides of the divide. Education can sow the seeds of peace, or the seeds of war.
We must ensure that educational funding goes to “seeds for peace”. We must create a new generation that holds ideas that differ from those of their parents, so that Peace will have new legs on which to stand.

To slightly alter the last stanza of the Song to Peace:

Don’t say the day will NOT come—
Bring the day!
Because it is not a dream
And in every square
Let only peace be cheered!