Empathy and dialogue is the pathway to peace

LEONARD Cohen once said of his iconic song, Hallelujah: “This world is full of conflicts and full of things that cannot be reconciled. But there are moments when we can … reconcile and embrace the whole mess, and that’s what I mean by Hallelujah.”

In his debut book, Ittay Flescher evokes both the words and spirit of Cohen. The title of Flescher’s book comes from this classic song: The Holy and the Broken – it’s a personal story and exploration of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and the maddening quest for peace between the warring peoples.

Flescher has lived in Jerusalem together with his family since 2018, moving there from Melbourne. He has not only had the perspective of an engaged observer, but also a view informed by deep engagement within that edgy city. As a passionate peace activist, writer and the educational director of Kids4Peace Jerusalem – an interfaith youth movement for Israeli and Palestinian children – he has moved almost seamlessly between his home in Emek Refaim in Jewish Jerusalem, and Sheikh Jarrah in East Jerusalem.

Building on his experience at Melbourne Jewish schools as a teacher and peace-building activist bringing together different faith schools and Indigenous Australians, Flescher facilitates courageous conversations and joint trust-building activities between Israeli and Palestinian teens.

A good section of the book outlines the daunting challenges and moral perplexities of peace-building during the Israel-Gaza War.

As someone who has been involved in interfaith work for some 30 years both in the multicultural environment and education – it was at Mt Scopus College after 9/11 that we launched the very first dialogue between Jewish and Muslim schools, a basis for the Building Bridges program – I found Flescher’s personal narrative engaging, inspirational, aspirational and deeply moving.

Flescher’s work with Kids4Peace includes a bi-yearly dialogue program for the parents which is valuable in its capacity to challenge and invite change beyond the kids.

As one parent said of the meeting: “I have lived in Jerusalem for many years and this is the first time I have ever had a personal conversation … with a woman wearing a hijab.”

The very fact that they were able to restart the program after October 7 is astonishing – a timely reminder that interfaith interaction especially between Jews and Muslims is far from extinct.

It is happening here in Australia and across the world.

Notwithstanding Flescher’s observation that these are usually attended by the elderly, I am aware of a growing number of young people who are seeking and working to restore peace between the religions.

Australian readers will surely find the chapters on Jewish education in Melbourne as well as the Jewish/Australian/Israeli/Palestinian nexus insightful and confronting.

They, and other readers across the world, are likely to either be informed and challenged, or irritated and dismissive, toward Flescher’s idealism and unwavering conviction that respectful dialogue imbued with empathy and compassion for the suffering of the other is both imperative and the only real pathway to peace.

You can dismiss Ittay Flescher as a hopeless dreamer or embrace him as a prophet of hope, but in either case, if you engage with his efforts as recorded in The Holy and the Broken, you are likely to come away better informed about the collective trauma of Israelis and Palestinians, and the search for small and important possibilities for healing and humanity in a world broken by war and polarisation.

This book provides the sliver of light that Leonard Cohen sought, a hint and a hope of the opportunity to reconcile and embrace amidst the mess and the brokenness

Rabbi Ralph Genende is the interfaith and community liaison at AIJAC.
The Holy and the Broken is published by Harper Collins, $36.99 rrp

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