True peace is built from the bottom up

In the midst of the ongoing crisis in the region, where relations have been dominated by war, conflict and the bloodshed and destruction that accompany them, talking about peace and peacebuilding can seem like self-convincing optimism, if not sheer fantasy. Yet history has repeatedly shown us that all wars come to an end. Ending them requires compromises — not necessarily comfortable ones for any of the sides involved. The only unknown is how much pain, agony and devastation will be inflicted before all sides see sense, or others help them to see sense, and agree to embark on the path of peace.

If we accept these propositions — and there is little real evidence to dispute them — then there is never a wrong or bad time to talk about peace, even more so when the cannons are roaring. More importantly, it is never the wrong time to build peace from the grassroots up, encouraging and supporting political decision-makers in the process.

Hence, I was delighted when my spouse and I were invited this month to visit Seeds of Peace’s annual flagship camp, a three-week residential summer camp. Seeds of Peace is one of the world’s oldest grassroots international peace organizations and its summer camp is packed with activities centered on nurturing the next generation of peacebuilders in the spirit of building bridges. This summer, after 30 years in the US, the camp was held in one of the most picturesque corners of southwest England, bringing together 120 teenagers in a place that is a far cry from the war zones in which many of these young people normally live.

Many came from India, Israel, Pakistan and Palestine. They have already experienced more than anyone at this stage of their lives should ever have to endure.

There is never a wrong or bad time to talk about peace, even more so when the cannons are roaring

Yossi Mekelberg

They were there to find and recognize each other’s humanity and to learn and internalize the value of peaceful dialogue, in which the most difficult experiences and issues are never avoided. Instead, they acquired the skills — I would argue, the art — of addressing the complexities and often the pain and anger that come with these conversations, then coming out of the other side with mutual empathy and embracing peace, coexistence and reconciliation as core values.

The organization already has 9,000 alumni and there is ample evidence that these values are carried well into adulthood, regardless of what participants go on to do later in life. Eva Armour, the executive director of Seeds of Peace, has been with the organization for 25 years, starting as a counsellor and working her way through the ranks. She still approaches everything taking place at the camp with the same enthusiasm, not to mention thoughtfulness, as if it were her first time.

Armour reflected: “We spend billions on wars and their aftermath, yet almost nothing on preventing them, even though we know what works.” Over 15 years of research on Seeds of Peace, she says, “proves that it is possible to bridge divides between people, even in the hardest contexts, through real relationships and honest dialogue. We can change how people care about and show up for each other; that enables them to imagine and work toward a reality where they can live together, safely and freely.”

I can almost hear the choir of skeptics asking how such dialogue can be possible or useful in the midst of pain, anger and trauma, particularly when it involves relatively small numbers of people who are, to an extent, a self-selected group. Or those who oppose talking to Israelis because they see it as “normalization.”

Let me begin with the debunked argument about normalization. Peace dialogue does not normalize a situation that is, by its very existence, abnormal. Nor does it legitimize the behavior of either side, because dialogue is not an arena for advocacy. Quite the opposite: it can be a way of liberating oneself from the burden of defending the indefensible and of exploring ways to change the horrendous realities in which people are surrounded and through which they have to grow up.

Nor is it simply about a feel-good factor for those who participate, especially those from the more powerful side, or about cleansing anyone’s conscience. It must be undertaken with a clear set of objectives: advancing a fair, just and sustainable peace that addresses and ultimately overcomes the imbalances and inequalities of the situation.

Peace dialogue does not normalize a situation that is abnormal. Nor does it legitimize the behavior of either side

Yossi Mekelberg

As for the earlier argument, understandable as it may sound, people-to-people activities are precisely what is so desperately and urgently needed, and from a relatively young age and on a much bigger scale. Talking through what each side has experienced, how people see one another and how they understand themselves within this situation, all in a safe environment with trained and experienced counsellors, whether between teenagers or adults, has a proven record of developing empathy by encouraging people to adhere more to shared values and less to tribalism.

It can stop people from taking the approach of “my country, right or wrong.” One begins to see the humanity in the other, while developing confidence in one’s own identity, an identity that does not negate the other. One can internalize the principle that there is no need to defend the indefensible without loving or caring any less about the societies one comes from.

During the happier days of Oslo, people-to-people organizations flourished, stemming from a genuine curiosity to learn more about each other and about how to reconcile and coexist peacefully. But now, with limited funds, they remain too few to create the critical mass required to initiate a peace process, see it through and make it sustainable in the aftermath of an agreement.

Armour said that the horrors of the past few years have convinced her that there is a need for more such activity, not less. As she put it: “We don’t defund medicine because people still get sick; we get the medicine out even more widely.” Moreover, one of the mistakes made by those who negotiated peace in the past was to see it as something to be done by elites and to assume that, since peace is obviously desirable, the people, or at least the vast majority of them, would support it.

That expectation proved to be, at best, partially correct. What was missing was a robust critical mass of people convinced that the dividends of a lasting peace are worth the compromises and risks it requires and who were ready to defend it with at least the same zeal as those determined to derail a peace process.

Grassroots peacebuilding activities are not a luxury, nor are they some cuddly exercises undertaken by well-intentioned but naive people who do not understand the harsh realities of war and conflict. Seeing how these young campers interact with one another, both within the more formal activities and between them, was an injection of new energy that anyone who deals with conflict resolution should witness. It reinforces the urgency to do more and to do so with greater determination. At the end of the day, true peace is not built only at negotiating tables — it is built from the bottom up.

• Yossi Mekelberg is a professor of international relations and an associate fellow of the MENA Program at Chatham House.

X: @YMekelberg