'It was a ticking bomb': Inside Israel's most unconfortable dialogue

TEMA, a grassroots initiative launched three years ago, aims to reintroduce the Israeli-Palestinian conflict into public discourse, which has largely vanished from Israeli political conversation, especially since October 7. The program involves participants studying the conflict within their own communities (Haredi, religious Zionist, secular, traditional, Israeli-Palestinian) for over a year, guided by academics, before engaging with groups holding different worldviews. Tzippy Diskind, a Haredi journalist, described her encounter with an Israeli-Palestinian group as "a ticking bomb" that only became real after a heated exchange. She also learned that Arab citizens of Israel lived under military rule for the state's first eighteen years, a fact she found "mind-blowing." Kholoud Abu Ahmad, a Palestinian participant, emphasized that political engagement was mandatory from a young age in her upbringing. Prof. Benjamin Ish-Shalom, another participant, noted that government agreements do not create peace between peoples, citing the lack of Egyptian tourism despite a long-standing treaty. While none of the participants claim the process yielded immediate solutions, they highlighted the significant collapse of trust between Israeli Jews and Arabs and the long road ahead for any sustainable resolution.