Our last blog on the Israel conflict resolution trip will be on the concept of hope. It was striking to me–and to the students, as outlined below–how many of our speakers focused on hope for the future. We heard this across the board–from released hostage Gadi Mozes, from NGO’s working in peace on the ground, and even as an academic theory of what humans need to move forward. It is a perfect way to close our reflections.
Through our International Peacemaking class, our trip to Israel offered a window into how peace and hope take shape beyond theory. This theme surfaced again and again in different forms: hope, not as naïve optimism, but as something deliberate and cultivated. Across grassroots activism, research, education, memory, and daily life, we encountered peacebuilding not as a single solution, but as a continuum rooted both in healing after loss and in investing in relationships before violence becomes destiny. That framework was first articulated in our conversation with Amal Tikvah, a nonprofit organization that believes a nonviolent future for Palestinians and Israelis is achievable. Rather than pursuing peace solely through advocacy or dialogue, Amal Tikvah works strategically and collaboratively within and across both societies, supporting and strengthening other NGOs engaged in peacebuilding. Individuals and civil society organizations can shape the conflict through grassroots action that creates ripple effects across society. This framing of hope as practical and collective set the tone for many of the conversations that followed.
Building on that, Oded Leshem introduced a formal framework for understanding hope. Oded Leshem, a political psychologist and researcher at Hebrew University, offered an analytical lens. Oded has dedicated his work to transforming hope from an abstract ideal into a measurable, evidence-backed framework. He explained that hope consists of two elements: the desire to achieve a goal and the expectation that the goal can realistically be achieved. His research showed that hope is most effective when these elements are balanced, when aspiration is paired with realism, helping explain why some peace efforts feel sustainable while others falter.
Hope also emerged through action in our conversation with Danny, Ayelet, and Christina. Danny, founder of Budo for Peace, described using martial arts as a bridge between communities, bringing children from different backgrounds together to train and compete. Ayelet focused on expanding women’s leadership, recognizing inclusion as essential to peace. Christina, a Palestinian Christian and head of a travel agency, spoke about bringing tourists to meet people on all sides of the conflict, hoping firsthand encounters would humanize narratives and soften hardened perceptions.
That emphasis on youth, immersion, and shared space carried directly into our conversation with Seeds of Peace and Jonathan Hefetz Gozlan, Director of the Israeli program and a former camper himself. Jonathan shared how attending the Seeds of Peace summer camp as a teenager shaped his worldview and led to lifelong friendships with peers from across the region, relationships that would otherwise never have existed. After October 7th, the first people to reach out to him were friends in Jordan, underscoring the durability of bonds formed long before crisis. Today, he works with an extraordinarily diverse group of campers, Druze, ultra-Orthodox Jewish, secular Israeli, Palestinian, Egyptian, and Jordanian, investing in empathy and trust at a stage when identities are still forming.
That emphasis on creating environments where people are seen as whole individuals carried into our visit to Tulip Winery in Kfar Tikva. The winery employs individuals with special needs. During the visit, we also heard from Mika, a thirteen-year-old living in northern Israel, whose story grounded these ideas in lived experience. She spoke with striking maturity about enduring war, describing how her bedroom doubled as a bomb shelter during rocket attacks and how her community supported soldiers heading to Gaza. Her resilience highlighted the human cost of conflict, but also the strength that can emerge from community support and shared responsibility.
One of the most emotional expressions of hope came through the Parents Circle Family Peace Forum, where we heard from Robi Damelin and Bassam Aramin. Both lost children to the conflict and spoke about their deliberate refusal to let grief harden into hatred. Instead, they chose to transform personal loss into a commitment to dialogue, bringing together bereaved Israeli and Palestinian families who might otherwise remain permanently divided. Their willingness to sit together across unimaginable divides reflected extraordinary moral courage and offered a vision of hope rooted not in resolution, but in sustained human connection.
That same tension between memory and hope took physical form during our time in Wadi Ara, guided by Lydia Aisenberg. Lydia helped us understand the region’s layered complexity, a corridor of predominantly Arab and Muslim towns near the Green Line, peaceful in appearance yet shaped by deep political and cultural divisions. The most powerful moment, however, came at her kibbutz. There, a Holocaust memorial stood unrepaired, its sculpture marked by bullet holes from an attack. Lydia explained that the community chose not to restore the statue until Jews worldwide are truly safe from persecution, reminding us why hope and peace remains so important. Together, these experiences illustrated peace not as an endpoint, but as an ongoing practice, rooted in grief, memory, and daily choice.
