Sarah Beller is Director of Education and Programs for J Street<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Share](\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\")
By SARAH BELLER<\/p>\n
Joan Davenny was more than just my eighth grade teacher. As my day school graduating class splashed through Ein Gedi and heard a young kibbutznik’s poem on Yom Hazikaron, walked the ramparts of the Old City and sang \u201cAl Kol Eileh\u201d in the courtyard of Goldstein Youth Village, Joan exuded a passion for Israel that rubbed off on every one of us. A few months later she went back to Jerusalem, to deepen her knowledge of Hebrew and Judaism. One day in August 1995, the news arrived that a bus had blown up, and she had been killed.<\/p>\n
At that moment, sitting at the kitchen table with my mother and sister, unable to eat a bite of the fruit salad in front of us, I faced a choice. I could decide that because of Joan\u2019s senseless murder, I would never trust a Palestinian or an Arab again and I would assume they all wanted to drive Israel into the sea. Or I could conclude that no one should have to experience violence, pain, or loss like my community and I were going through, and that I would do my utmost to fight for a peaceful resolution to the conflict.<\/p>\n
At a community gathering organized to help us cope with this sudden, shocking loss, a classmate joked sadly that Joan had probably been striking up a friendly conversation with the attacker at the time of the bombing. That’s just the kind of person she was.<\/p>\n
My choice was clear: I would be like Joan, someone who loved Israel fiercely\u2014and hated no one.<\/p>\n
I bring up these memories now\u2014eighteen years later, nearly to the day\u2014because, for the first time in several years, a serious push toward a two-state solution is underway. In the lead-up to Secretary of State John Kerry\u2019s announcement of the restarting of talks, many commentators expressed skepticism that we\u2019d even get to the starting line that we\u2019re now at.<\/p>\n
To be sure, cynicism is an understandable response after decades of failed attempts and disappointments. But with Prime Minister Netanyahu\u2019s announcement that Israel would release 104 Palestinian prisoners as a signal of seriousness to bring the Palestinian leadership to the table, many who brushed off Secretary Kerry\u2019s efforts as inconsequential are starting to take note.<\/p>\n
The prisoner release is a reminder of the real risks and painful compromises involved in reaching a peace deal and ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. For many American Jews who are connected to Israel, we are reminded of people we have known and loved like Joan \u2013 friends and relatives, teachers and students whose lives have been affected, and in some cases cut short, by violence in Israel.<\/p>\n
I know that I am far from alone in my grief at losing someone I cared about to violence in this ongoing conflict. Regrettably, many readers of this newspaper have faced similar tragedies. And together we face a choice: do we use our grief to justify inaction, or worse? Or do we honor our loved ones\u2019 memories by putting all our weight into supporting an end to the conflict and a peaceful, secure future for Israel, living side by side with a Palestinian state?<\/p>\n
\u201cAl hadvash v\u2019al ha\u2019oketz<\/em> \/ On the honey and on the sting,\u201d we sang Joan\u2019s favorite song on our last evening in Jerusalem back in May of 1995. \u201cAl hamar v\u2019hamatok<\/em> \/ On the bitter and the sweet.\u201d No one said it wouldn\u2019t be painful. But if we don\u2019t expose ourselves to the sting, we may never taste the honey.<\/p>\n Sarah Beller is Director of Education and Programs for J Street<\/em><\/p>\n