Fortunate are the peacemakers, for they, pupils of God, shall be named.*
Creating Peace requires right effort, time, courage to let go—to give oneself to silence, breath; and then under simple conditions and often with support of a non-anxious person(s), receive mediation process where parties within a simple practice can hear oneself and the other, share their suffering, needs, mutually understand the other and carve out a path to peaceful resolution.
Thich Nhat Hanh in this excerpt offers an example of how this simple, profound process can work with any faction experiencing the challenge of letting go of their suffering, who like collective America and Israel, out of a fear of the unknown, prefer suffering that is familiar.
From The Conversation: Making Sense of These Times: What do we make of ourselves after September 11, 2001,
This summer, a group of Palestinians came to Plum Village and practiced together with a group of Israelis, a few dozen of them. We sponsored their coming and practicing together. In two weeks, they learned to sit together, walk mindfully together, enjoy silent meals together, and sit quietly in order to listen to each other. The practice taken up was very successful. At the end of the two weeks practice, they gave us a wonderful, wonderful report. One lady said, "That, this is the first time in my life that I see that peace in the Middle East is possible." Another young person said, "That when I first arrived in Plum Village, I did not believe that Plum Village was something real because in the situation of my country, you live in constant fear and anger. When your children get onto the bus, you are not sure that they will be coming home. When you go to the market, you are not sure that you will survive to go home to your family. When you come to Plum Village, you see people looking at each other with loving kindness, talking with other kindly, walking peacefully, and doing everything mindfully. We did not believe that it was possible. It did not look real to me."
But in the peaceful setting of Plum Village, they were able to be together, to live together, and to listen to each other, and finally understanding came. They promised that when they returned to the Middle East, they would continue the practice. They will organize a day of practice every week at the local level and a day of mindfulness at the national level. And they plan to come to Plum Village as a bigger group to continue the practice.
I think that if nations like America [Israel] can organize that kind of setting where people can come together and spend their time practicing peace, then they will be able to calm down their feelings, their fears, and peaceful negotiation will be much easier.
https://practiceofzen.com/2020/09/16/peace-is-possible/
*
The Gospel According to St Matthew 5.9 [personal translation]
http://www.theconversation.org/archive/essence.html
https://plumvillage.org/articles/peace-between-palestinians-and-israelis
