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I stand with Israel, but my heart is also with the Palestinians Paula Dail | October 8, 2024 | 6 Tishri 5785 | 6 Tishri 5785

Writer's picture: Paula DailPaula Dail

Full disclosure: I am a heritage Jew, and while this legacy informs every aspect of my life, I am not outwardly observant. I firmly believe in tikkun olam and am also aware that while I am not obligated to try to repair everything that is broken in the world, I am obligated to not ignore the wrongs I see. 

I strongly believe in the state of Israel, in Israel as the rightful Jewish homeland, and in Israel’s right to defend itself against Hamas, or any enemy, terrorist or otherwise. However, I also believe in the Palestinian people’s right to exist and live in peace, just as much as I believe in Israel’s right to exist and the Jewish people’s right to live in peace. This is what I believed before the Oct. 7 terrorist attack, and I have not changed my mind in the nearly 365 days since. 

I view the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that led to Hamas attacking Israel on Oct. 7 as a clash involving ancient beliefs and radical, extremist ideologies – on both sides. No disagreement is more difficult to resolve, because politicians cannot heal such deep generational, inherited trauma. After Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin signed the Camp David Accords, Sadat was assassinated. After Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat signed the Oslo Accords, Rabin was assassinated. This history tells us politically contrived solutions are not the answer.  

The Oct. 7 attack convinced me that we must stop believing this conflict is resolvable. Instead, we must accept the challenge of figuring out how to live with it. My experience in Israel has shown me that this conflict is not a zero-sum, win-loss game for either Israeli or Palestinian people as individuals; it is a political mess that is victimizing everyone on both sides, and they just want it to stop. One-on-one, despite their differences, the Israelis and Palestinians know how to peacefully co-exist and want war-mongering politics and extremist ideologies to get out of their way and let them get on with living their lives. The widespread protests against the current Israeli government support this view, and so should we. 

Israel has the most advanced anti-terrorist security force in the world and can both stop the rockets and bullets and protect itself at the same time. Mossad can deal with the terrorist problem without the collateral civilian casualties, if the Israeli prime minister, to whom it directly answers, issues this order. That this has not occurred is the fault of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s failed strategy of playing political songs on a broken fiddle while Israeli hearts break, the Jewish homeland burns, and innocent Palestinians die. 

We have seen a dramatic increase in antisemitism worldwide and accusations that the Jews are doing to the Palestinians what the Germans did to the Jews in World War II. These are difficult allegations to hear, because they are unfair and ignore the fact that the Germans attacked the Jews, not the other way around.  

The Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel was devastating in a surprisingly personal way I never anticipated. I tore a shirt to express my grief. I said “Mourner’s Kaddish,” then emptied my closet of all colorful clothing, because the suffering wrought in the wake of Oct. 7 has rendered my people’s world colorless. Even though I know Jews have survived thousands of years of persecution, and lived to dance again, I can’t imagine myself dancing again until the Palestinian people can also dance. We don’t have to dance together; we only need to stand aside and let each of us dance to our own tune. Until this occurs, I sit shiva in my heart every day. 

I have experienced the days since Oct. 7 as a painful and transformational time when, more than ever before, I have been pushed to open my heart wide enough to hold more opposing thoughts than I ever thought possible. Even though Israel was attacked and has the absolute moral right to respond, I am heartbroken to see Palestinian suffering. Israel has a clear moral imperative to negotiate an immediate cease-fire that includes a return of the hostages. 

No matter what, my heart remains with Israel, yet it is a big enough heart to make room for the Palestinian people as well as my own. I don’t need to hate Palestinians to feel better about myself and hope that someday they will no longer need to hate me to feel better about themselves. I don’t know whether the Palestinian people’s heart will ever be big enough to include me, as a Jew, but I move forward committed to doing all I can to make it be so. 


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