I keep trying to explain this Israel-Hamas war to my kids, and it’s really so caught up in the past, both near and distant. Repeatedly, one side’s autonomy, safety, and identity is violated by the other. And it’s piled up over time to the current conflict.
The Daily tackles this history in their 1948 episode, describing an “arsenal of memory” that gets “chiseled in stone” to define each side’s grievances.
When you go to the Middle East, you see immediately how people are imprisoned by history, the especially in Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The Daily
It’s understandable but tragically and obviously unhelpful.
Yes, the past is full or pain and terror. Don’t get stuck in it – move past it like any wise person would do.
Right actions for the future are the best apologies for wrong ones in the past.
Tryon Edwards, theologian
And yes, it can be done.
Ireland put a similar conflict behind it: a centuries-old conflict of two intertwined groups of people involving religion, culture, territorial disputes, terror, violence, and injustice.
They ended up with a two-state solution: Ireland and the UK. There is peace and prosperity. People move freely between the countries. There are no checkpoints, walls, vengeance deaths, or bombings.
There are pubs and museums, a peaceful countryside, and a booming film industry.
The past is recognized and understood but no longer used to justify self-destructive, violent behavior. The “Troubles” are gone, but not forgotten.
The world needs to step up and make this happen in the Middle East. Doing so will require setting aside some fear, which is just a mind killer, but a peaceful solution can happen because it has happened elsewhere.
Mental Break Town 