Sahar's summary

My Dear Friends

Everyone who asks me how the camp was, I tell them – a long process.

That's short to explain what we have been through these two weeks together.

I believe that the process made a great change in us, everyone in the Israeli group, me personally, and I hope you too. I went through stages of self defense, anger, hopeless moods, and then sympathy, empathy, friendships, trust, and hope again.

I believe that we went together from self deception to recognizing the other side, and even feeling the other side's feelings.

I told you on the day we said goodbyes – I don't know what will happen in the future. I don't know what can I do right now to change anything, but I'm not without hope, because I know that some day I will have the opportunity to change something in our reality. And it doesn't matter if it will be today, tomorrow or when I'm 40 years old. All I know is that I take this camp with me, where ever I go, and if there will be an opportunity to bring it up I'll tell others everything I went through with you.

I want to share with you what I wrote on the yellow note – what am I taking with me from this camp:

• Memories of the process we made and how we changed our emotions and opinions.
• The ability to listen to someone else's pain, without the need to immediately express mine. To see both sides and not to live in self deception.
• With no anger, and no revenge, only listening.
• I take the ambition to trust the Palestinians, because it's the only way.
• To remember that our problem is the mutual mistrust and the fear that haunts us, to give up a little bit of our safe spot, because only when you expose your vulnerability you can get to the good things in life, just with a little bit of trust.
• We are all human beings that want to live in peace and to fulfill our rights, and I understand the need to call out when it doesn't happen.
• To give time to the solution, to look for the long term and not to loose hope. If not today then tomorrow, if not this year then the next one, or in the age of 40, sometime the opportunity to change, to effect will come.
• I want to take all of the people's smiles. The warmth, the real will to make us feel good. The friendships.
• My good friends, supporting and loving, laughing and crying (from laughter).
• The warmth of the leaders' team.
• People's real intentions.
• Everyone's belief that there is a future. There is hope to live in peace, sometime.