Eight Realities
I The Reality of Mutual Animosity
Since prior to the founding of the State of Israel up to and including the present time, there has been a state of mutual animosity between Arabs and Jews. Though more apparent during periods of exacerbation and unrest, such animosity has existed for decades. It is a state of reality visible to the world.
II The Reality of a Desire For Mutual Departure
Since prior to the founding of the State of Israel up to and including the present time, the history of relationships between Arabs and Jews residing in Israel and in adjacent territories is characterized by a desire, often openly expressed, for departure of the Other from Israel.
III The Reality of Non-Departure
Neither Arabs nor Jews wish or intend to depart from Israel. Neither have the means to compel the departure of the Other nor do either have an expectation of departure by the Other. It is a token of the deepest faith adhered to by both Arabs and Jews, respectively and separately as to each, residing in Israel and in adjacent territories, that the land of Israel is and will be for the foreseeable future and beyond, as to each, the homeland and place of residence of their people, and that at no point in time within the foreseeable future and beyond, as to each, will they depart therefrom. It is the present expectation among both peoples and the world as a whole that, for the foreseeable future and beyond, both Arabs and Jews are destined, separately or together, to live and co-exist therein.
IV The Reality of Mutual Acceptance and Respect in Daily Life
The reality of daily life in Israel consists of mutual interactions, acceptance, and respect between both Jews and Arabs as a necessary and agreed upon practice, in recognition that the reality of co-existence and the well-being respectively of both mandate mutual acceptance and respect.
V The Reality of a Need For Tension Reduction
The well-being of persons of all ethnicities and backgrounds in Israel and adjacent territories mandates tension reduction between Arabs and Jews.
VI The Reality of a Need For Full and Open Communication
Necessary to tension reduction between Arabs and Jews is open and unrestricted access, to the fullest extent permitted by law, to communications between Arabs and Jews and full access by all to communication with government and to governmental information that may aid either, any, or all in their private lives.
VII The Reality That Friendship is Possible
Jews and Arabs have a common biblical heritage in descendance from Abraham. Both nourish aspirations of health, happiness, and prosperity. Both have traditions of hospitality and human warmth towards each other and strangers.
The power of turning hatred into friendship is morally compelling. Both peoples share the pain of a century long culture of conflict inhering in animosity and often open hatred, the very opposite of which if turned on its head would be friendship.
In previous times Arabs and Jews were friendly to each other and recurrent states of hostility and unrest were rare. Human rights supportive organizations currently functioning in Israel exhibit daily examples of a friendship-related reality.
The humanity of both peoples predicts that, absent historical events that have turned them into enemies, Jews and Arabs would be friends. Many Arabs and Jews acknowledge that nationality-based hatred and animosity is pathological, and that the state of tension and hostility that has characterized their geographical contiguity and interaction since the formation of the State of Israel is a historical anomaly that by simple good sense and the mutual will of both peoples could be undone and made right.
Nationality-based hatred and animosity is reinforced by antagonistic peer pressures recurrent in the communities of both. For every human being in a moment of reflection freed from the compulsiveness of peer-supported nationality-based religion-based animosity, there exists a natural inclination, rooted in the human condition of individual Jews and Arabs, to gravitate to a societal environment in which the psychology of animosity is converted into a psychology of friendship.
VIII The Reality of Scripture
In ancient scriptures respectively revered by both Arabs and Jews, the Torah as to Jews and the Quran as to Muslims, is embedded a supreme tenet, a moral imperative of global reach: Love Thy Neighbor as Thyself.
Copyright Mouth Peace Inc. 2017
