Walking in Each Other’s Shoes: Stories for Peace

Rami Elhanan is Jewish, and born in Jerusalem of seven generations. Bassam Aramin is Palestinian, and lives in Anata, in the West Bank. Both have made grief and pain a catalyst for peace. Their lives have been marked by the conflict on opposing sides, and both have suffered the irreparable loss of their daughters, Smadar and Abir, one killed in a Hamas attack and the other by an Israeli police officer. As they see it, in the face of such terrible events there are only two options: to join the circle of hatred and violence that ravages the Middle East, making it never-ending, or to try to walk in the other person’s shoes and choose dialogue. Years ago, they chose the second option and have ended up being great friends.

What does it mean to live in an occupied land, dominated by violence? What happens when you’ve been educated to dehumanize and hate others? What wounds does your enemy bear? Today, the two travel all over the world explaining their experiences in the conviction that we need to listen to the stories of others to deactivate prejudices and exercise humanity. As peace activists, they believe that dialogue between equals is the only possible way to resolve conflicts and reach fair peace agreements, which is why they defend an end to the occupation. Their powerful message crosses territories to tell us about commitment to others, the courage of empathy, the duty of dialogue and the challenge that talking about peace entails today.

The session has a pedagogical dossier (in Catalan) so that the students can work on the contents beforehand in the classroom and thus make the most out of the lecture.