“This is not where we are going to change the whole country”: in Tel Aviv, peace gets a folding seat

Presented as the largest pro-peace gathering expected this year in Israel, the event, launched in 2024 by Israeli and Palestinian NGOs, attempts to recreate a space for dialogue that has become rare, in a country crossed by nearly three years of war and with the approach of a critical election for the future of the Hebrew state. This Thursday, from lunchtime, the public flocks to Tel Aviv Expo, the city’s large exhibition hall. Retirees, young people from educational movements, a few families: Israeli Jews and Arabs talk, often already convinced.

“Today, even the signs are becoming suspect,” says Nava Rozolyo, a lawyer and activist from Jerusalem. She mentions the recent case of a young academic arrested for wearing a yarmulke symbolizing coexistence, decorated with the Israeli and Palestinian flags, which the police then returned to him cut up, without the Palestinian symbol. “It’s not here that we’re going to change the whole country,” she admits. “But it is here that cooperation can arise. And right now, that’s already a lot. »

By Editor