I recently attended an advocacy forum where people are all over the world came together. Where, what and when is irrelevant, but while I was there I got talking to an American-Israeli. [The forum was not on the Middle East.]

This Israeli and I actually became good friends. I learned that he divided his time between New York and Jerusalem. Usually making a new friend does not affect your world view. But befriending an Israeli did.

We, for the most part, avoided the heated issue of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He knows am an Arab and I know he’s an Israeli Jew and the conversation may get awkward or worse. We just became friends by talking about normal things: girls, travels, education, ect... He also knows some Arabic.

On my last night there, he asked me how to say “brother” in Arabic. Upon telling him “akhee;” he responded to me, “we’re brothers.” Those words were very endearing. He then went on to state just how absurd it is that Arabs and Jews fight, that we share so much in terms of heritage, language and genetic makeup. I told him agreed and that we are both cousins, the descendents of Abraham: Issac and Ishmael. And that one day things we be better and Arabs and Jews and get together and have fun like we are.

This does not in any sense lessen my fierce opposition and hatred for the Israeli occupation. I do not take back my words condemning Israeli murder of Palestinians and the unending crimes of occupation. And there are some Israelis whom I will never even talk to let alone befriend.

But meeting an Israeli did teach me that there are many Israelis whom can be part of the solution for peace. That we should not generalizes about all Israelis, and that we should make an effort to listen to the other side and work together in a spirit of brotherhood to achieve lasting peace. That may mean compromise along a two-state solution, or it may still mean the one-state. But the starting point has to be that the other side is worth talking to and listening to and that he have to make an effort to befriend one another and then work from that point toward a real peace based on mutual respect and equality.