Nova Festival Site Memorial: A music festival in Southern Israel, attacked by Hamas and Palestinian Jihad Terrorists on Oct 7. Many young people were raped, murdered, or kidnapped from this site.
A Photo of a Northern Gaza city I took in February 2024, from just outside S'derot, a city close to the Gazan Border. So much of the northern Gaza strip is destroyed, millions displaced as they seek shelter from war. Thousands killed.
In February 2024, I went to Israel and the West Bank to try to understand how Israel has been changed in the aftermath of the Oct 7th Hamas Terrorist Attacks.
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In the West, we are shown this as a binary, were one is identified as Pro-Palestine or Pro-Israel. This is a false dichotomy. My biggest takeaway is that both communities have been hit exactly in their points of trauma, and as the war continues and the hostages remain held, neither side can begin to mourn and understand the loss.
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Both Israeli and Palestinian societies exist along a spectrum of opinion, political position and willingness to engage with the other side. There are people on both sides who no longer wish to deal with the "other", and there are people who believe the only path forward is together.
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Of course, there is every position in between.
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For some of this trip, I was part of a Canadian Jewish Delegation, and had access to security, to amazing tour guides and speakers, and heard from military, political and civilian sectors. Other parts were on my own, speaking with Jewish residents of the West Bank (Settlers), Palestinian Residents of East Jerusalem (67 Arabs), Palestinian Arab Citizens of Israel (48 Arabs), Christian and Muslim Palestinians in Bethlehem and Ramallah. I went to the North to speak with Evacuees, and visited the Gaza envelope to hear from survivors of the Oct 7 attacks, families of the hostages, and visited many areas of Israel.
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For me, being able to reach out to all those willing to speak with me, gave me tremendous perspective, and I wanted to share what I heard and saw. The opinions I share in this video do not represent any groups that I am involved with- these are my reflections.