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Discourse as Practice: Jewish and Palestinian Israelis in a

Dialogue Group.From Speaking To Acting - 2000-2004 1

Miki Motola, PhD., PsychologyOranim College, Israel

Andr Schnberg, M.Soc.Sc., Management Consultant, Board Member, Innovation &Change In Israeli Society

[email protected] [email protected] Harashim 24954 Raanana 43 107

Mitspe Harashim 24954 Kazan 8 Raanana

Israel Israel

Fax: +972 4 - 9802060 Fax: +972 -153-9-743 50 97

1 The Dialogue group which is the subject of this paper was conjointly established in autumn 2000 by Miki Motola and WalidMula, M.A., from Yarka Israel. We thank all the group members for their participation in this venture and for their generouscooperation with our interviewing. Batya (Betsy) Kallus, also one of the group members, helped a lot with editing a late versionof this paper. The ideas presented here do not necessarily represent all or any of the other group members.The significance of this last sentence will be fully appreciated after the reading of the paper.

Discourse as Practice p1


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the wake of this war, the so-called Israeli War of Independence (1948), many Arab

Palestinians, considered or considering themselves as hostile to the Jewish State, were

either expelled, thrown out or fled their towns and villages; the historical truth is an open

field of fierce contention between the two sides. For the last years, the counterpart to theJewish Israeli discourse of the War of Liberation ( Milhement HaShihrur ) has been the

Palestinian Naqba the Catastrophe of the Palestinians who lost their homes and

homeland. Beside the efforts to overcome the de-facto, if not de-jure discrimination against

the Arabs in Israel, part of the political and ideological struggle of the Arab minority in

Israel, those last twenty years, has been a struggle about the discourse adequately or

legitimately defining reality and history.

1. The First-Model Dialogue ( Duki ) Groups: The Story of a Failure

For more than 20 years, the Israeli, mainly educational, establishment had founded and

maintained dialogue groups in which Jewish and Arab Israelis met together in order to

get to know each other, to learn about each others cultures, and to establish personal ties

in order to diminish the estrangement between these two sectors of the population, and

strengthen the identification of the non-Jewish part of the population to the state of Israel.

Typically, the groups met at high-schools, and comprised teachers and students, and

sometimes, parents of younger school children. The groups met for a week-end or two, or

for three to at most five meetings, and were especially focused on the eradication of mutual

stereotypes, on one hand, and on the design of better communications between the two

sectors.

Those groups have been derogatorily called duki groups a childish, pejorativediminutive of Du-Kiyum , meaning co-existence, thus pointing to their pseudo-role in

fostering this co-existence. The duki groups typically resulted in short-term catharsis and

feelings of momentary closeness, or, not less frequently, in the feeling that there is no way

to build a bridge between the two communities.



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The origins of the project in Israel are often linked to the consternation and alarm which

spread within the liberal wing of Zionist Israeli political parties following a 1980 survey of

the attitudes of Israeli youths vis--vis the Arab/Palestinian citizens of Israel (Rabinowitz

2001; Har-Even 1985; Maoz 1997). The survey (Zemach 1980) indicated a stereotypicaltendency among Jewish Israeli youngsters to view all Arabs, anywhere within the state of

Israel and beyond, as a menacing and ill-intentioned collective. It also exposed a worrying

level of support for legal and administrative measures which, if ever implemented, would

curb the freedom of Israeli-Arab/Palestinian citizens of Israel, and limit their civil and even

human rights.

Most of the programs conducted in Israel under the title of coexistence or dialogue groups

were inspired by the contact theory developed by Allport (1954). This theory suggests

that under several conditions contact between people from belligerent groups can reduce

enmity and prejudices, and brings forth an increase in positive mutual attitudes.

It is not clear when the authorities or the left-of-center-part of the establishment

understood that these groups were not really achieving either their professed, nor their more

undeclared aims. An evaluation research was initiated by one of the organizations which

were very active in these groups. As the results were quite inconclusive the research was

put aside, and those who initiated the research (as well as the Ministry of Education)

refused to publish it (Ophir 2002).

It became quite clear that these groups did not result in any real or long-term change. When

the the right-of-center political leadership of the national religious party Mafdal ) took

over control of the Ministry of Education, governmental and establishment support for those activities ceased. On the contrary, stress was placed on strengthening Jewish identity

and study of Jewish traditions. The October 2000 events in Israel proper (i.e. in the

sovereign regions of Israel, within the Green Line, non-occupied regions, those inhabited

by Palestinian (Arab) Israelis, citizens of the State of Israel, as distinct from the Palestinian



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Ultimately, the duki field produced two opposing means to break with the status quo. A

social and community-oriented model was created in Neve-Shalom - the only village in

Israel conceived and inhabited in equal number and symmetrical balance of power, by bothIsraeli Arabs and Jews (Halabi 2000). In an apparent paradox, in Neve Shaloms,School

for Peace,(a center for training and encounter between Israeli Jews and Arabs) they favor

uni-ethnic group meetings (Jews and Arabs working separately in different group).In these

homogenous groups they accentuate group identities, empower the Arab participants and

help them develop their cultural and political awareness, in a community environment

which is meticulously built as equal and symmetrical.

Another development, which was quite different if not opposite to Neve Shalom endeavor,

was to merge together Arab and Jews pupils in a common bilingual space. Four schools

were created in Israel in which pupils were thought by Arab and Jewish teachers in Hebrew

and Arabic. These represent a real challenge to the main-stream educational system given

that, normally, or normatively, Israeli Arab/Palestinian and Jewish children study in two

separate systems of education.

But it is interesting to notice that in both solutions, the vision of ethnic/political identities

functions quite similarly. Neve-Shalom Primary School purposely empowers the Arabs

children in their Arabic identity, both in its cultural and political components. Therefore it

is not surprising that they do not question the issue of identity. During the outbreak of the

Intifada, there were organized discussions about identity among the parents in the

Bilingual Schools established in the Galilee and Jerusalem among. The schools believed

that it was not possible to discuss identity effectively with the children so the topic wasraised among the parents. They will probably say that they cannot afford the luxury as a

minority of raise doubts and hence taking the risk of weakening the Arabs children

positions facing the Jews.



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Paradoxically parents in the bilingual school, find themselves reacting in a similar way.

Normally parents in these schools are moderate, liberal and secular. But often they have to

deal with religious and national contents, much more than they would do in the main-

stream schools. It is as if the space of these bi-lingual schools polarized their identity andthey were bound in their way to define themselves following the traditional polarized way.

As we can see these two options, enhancing political awareness in homogenous ethnic

groups or educating children in a bi-lingual bi-ethnical environment, challenge the outside

reality. On other hand we can question the limit of these lines of action since, it seems, that

they do not defy the essentialist perspective of national/ethnic identity.

Our hypothesis is that a psychological, or socio-psychological, approach cannot

realistically or effectively deal with basic, structural, domination problems. In our view, the

critical question is not which approach is used in the facilitation of the group -

psychoanalytical or more ego-related - as long as it stays within the framework of a

group or even group relations approach. In the view presented here, the problematic of

the Arab-Jewish position in Israel is not a consequence of psychological differences.

Differences- if there are such are a consequence of the fundamental existential position of

two structural groups and their real interests (see J. Habermas, 1987 not only

communication, but interests as a substratum). The crucial classificatory variable, in any

relationship or relatedness between Jews and Arabs/Israeli Palestinians in Israel, is that of

Jewish supremacy and domination. All other differences, or similarities, between them are

secondary.

Group-relations activities, either around the Tavistock or the NTL models (for example,Golombiewski, 1989), have usually been seen as a microcosmic representation of the social

macrocosm (see, for example, Philip Slater, 1966; or so many articles at ISPSO

conferences; for a critical view, see A.Schonberg, 1998). The laboratory model is clearly

unfit to deal with structural or sociological issues as it builds a wholly artificial



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environment. As a microcosm, it is unfit as well to truly represent the world, even as

regards the most universal psychological or psycho-social dimensions as authority,

dependency, cooperation, envy, anxiety, etc. In the laboratory, the peculiar sociological,

ethnic, or even gender conditions that characterizes reality cannot be replicated in anysatisfactory manner. In fact, this laboratory views aims at creating conditions in which

universal or personal dimensions are examined. In the issue we tackle here personal is

personal is personal. It cannot claim to represent or deal with sociological issues. Likewise,

the universal. If it is universal, and common to every human beings- it ceases to enable

any substantial, sociological, ethnic, religious, etc. differentiating.

The Leicester-Tavistock model claims to enable a better representation of the world. For

example, the argument goes that the structure of management of a conference is somehow a

representation or a duplicate of the political or dominance arrangements in society in such

a matter that working with resistance, for example, could be easily interpreted or

manipulated by the staff as a personal, psychoanalytic resistance, and not as the attempt of

political emancipation by a representative of a dominated minority (see Philip Boxers

analysis, for example 1994; or Brian Palmer, 2001). The very notion of representative, in

staff or membership, of a group or sector in the society at large, stresses and deepens the

dilemma rather than solving it. It is as if we play in reality, and then mimic reality, and

then forget that we are outside reality it has become hyper reality (see Umberto Eco,

1983; and Jean Baudrillard 1998, 2001, on simulation, simulacre and hyper reality).

For example, opening the Directorate to observation or negotiations during the

organizational event at a Tavistock-Leicester conference accurately enables members to

deal with their own, personal, projections and fantasies about management, authority,leadership, etc. Trying to apply those learnings and insights to an understanding of the

broader society or organization of which the conference is but a part might be a frequent

leap, but it is nevertheless a leap. With all we know about transference, contra-transference,

projection, projective identification, etc. can we really expect that any learning can be done



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on the very dimensions of dominance and identity, when structural, sociological, political

reality impinges on the world of phantasies that we create or enable in a Conference?

Even if political relations (not relationships) can be examined in a Conference, there are

bound to be interpreted in a personal way, a-symmetrically, and out of the actual,sociological and political context.

Can we create a space, a potential space, where it would be possible to deal with

these political and sociological relations in a not-only-personal manner? When we talk

about building a space we first of all mean to widen our conceptual field or broaden our

working concepts. Secondly, we speak about our experience of designing a new group

setting in accordance with the challenge of breaking the conservative model of the duki

groups.

To understand the logic of our venture one has to go beyond disciplinary frontiers between

psychoanalysis and sociology. In this logic we found very interesting to compare the notion

of field in the sociology of Bourdieu and the potential space conceptualized by

Winnicott.

A field, according to Bourdieu (1992), consists of a set of objective, historical relations

between positions anchored in a certain form of power or capital. The literary, academic,

artistic, scientific, psychoanalytic (and so on) fields are all spaces of conflicts and

competition. They are all encompassed by the field of power which can be considered as a

meta field. Every field is characterized by its traditions, implicit and explicit norms, its

orthodoxies and heresies, the legitimized issues to deal with and by rules that permit people

to engage in it. A field is not a simply dead structure but a space of play which exists assuch only to the extent that players enter into it who believe in and actively pursue the

prizes it offers. In others words people have to participate to the fields illusions. Each

field wrote Bourdieu calls forth and gives life to a specific form of interest, a specific

illusion, as tacit recognition of the value of the stakes of the game and as practical mastery



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of its rules. The notion of field replaces the more abstract concepts of society and social

classes. People are the product of their field, which mean they are mold by the time, space

and rules-of-the-game where and when they grew up. They develop a certain habitus,

which is a set of historical relations deposited within individuals bodies in the form of mental and corporal schemata of perception, appreciation, and action. During their

trajectories, social agents cross different fields simultaneously or consecutively, and each

time there is a silent and profound work of adaptation, conversion, and other changes in

these schemata that occur within a dynamic of complicity between the line of power of the

field (its structure) and the plasticity or rigidity of the habitus.

We can observe in practice this rather abstract description when we observe the duki

encounter groups. Participants will act and react on one level according to universal

features, such as anxieties, transferences, projections, identifications. On another level they

will differ according to their social trajectories in different fields (domestic, education

etc) and in the field of power.

Arabs and Jews differ in their behaviors in the duki setting not because of some essential

or ethnic characteristics but because they express deep rooted modes of thinking

embodied during their trajectories in a violent and polarized field of power.

For instance practitioners in dialogue groups often observe that when facilitators solicit

personal and emotional experience in the group work, Jewish participants have no

difficulties to give themselves to the task while Israeli-Arabs participants, especially men,

have trouble complying as they prefer a more collective mode of speaking. At first glance

one can suppose that a psychological explanation will be enough. The collective society in

which Arab children are raised, compared to the individualistic Jewish society mightexplain this difference (Dwairy 1998). The fact that in other cultures (Weiss 2001) we find

similar interactions when dealing with minority/majority encounters might suggest that not

psychological differences but rather power relations are at the source of such differences.

The personal testimony of an Arab psychology professor, a very self-confident person, can



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help deepen our understanding of the issue. He told us that he stopped participating in

"duki" groups because he felt inauthentic in groups with Jewish participants. This feeling

was caused, firstly, because he felt compelled to join an Arab unified stand facing the Jews,

so that there was no more space left for authentic personal positions. Secondly, he felt thateven with radical, leftist Jews, there were limits to the common discussion - implicit

borders, gently but evidently imposed by the Jewish participants. These limits generally

concerned issues related to the 1948 war, the Nakba and the position of Arab refugees

inside Israel. We can interpret the reactions of this socially successful and well connected

intellectual as a reaction to a subtle symbolic violence (Bourdieu 2001). It is apparently

what happens to most Arab intellectuals in Israel, and that subtle, symbolic violence creates

a deep feeling of alienation and anger. Thanks to his professional abilities he managed to

deal with these sentiments, and suppress them in his every day life. In the encounter groups

he found himself trapped. In the one hand he could no more ignore these suppressed

affects, in the other one he could not afford to express them without breaking a kind of

status quo he reached internally and externally. Political-correctness functioned, as well, as

a censoring mechanism.

As we established this dialogue group, we were confronted, therefore, with the following

question. Is it possible to create a space, a potential space, in the Winnicotian sense, where

people will be free to play with their identities? To examine different components of their

own selves? To reexamine their attitudes without becoming frozen in superficial or

politically-correct stands? Would it be possible for Israeli Arabs and Jews to authentically

examine their thoughts, emotions and actions - without any kind of limitations?

3. Another Model: A New Potential Space



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The outbreak of the Al-Aqsa Intifada, in the territories of the Palestinian Authority, has

had tremendous implications in the realm of Palestinian-Israeli relations, and those

pertaining to the relations within Israel itself, between Israeli Arabs and Jews. Stemming

out of frustration about the discriminatory practices of the government as against the Arabminority, and as an act of solidarity with the Palestinian Arabs in the occupied territories,

and just after they had launched the second, Al-Aqsa, Intifada, in October 2000, there were

a host of violent demonstrations by Israeli Arabs,. Those manifestations, inside Israel, were

fiercely and violently repressed by the Israeli police, who fired at the demonstrators, killing

13 people. For example, the establishment of road blocks in numerous communities in the

Galilee, cut off the lines of communication among Jewish Israelis living alongside Arab

communities. Jews who had for years lived peacefully and even were friendly with their

Arab neighbors felt endangered. The situation had become so delicate that even those more

liberal, radical or leftist Jews who had been involved in dialogue and co-existence, and

active worked with Israeli Arabs on citizenship-equality issues, felt endangered and

threatened. The memories and associations which were raised by those events, both in the

press and among people in their communities, directly linked the October 2000 situation to

what had happened during the 1948-49 War of Independence. Jews, who for years had

shopped and gone on outings in Arab villages, stopped going into Arab villages and towns,

and a general climate of suspicion and mistrust arose among, or between, former friends

and neighbors.

As a response to those fierce October 2000 manifestations within the 1967 borders of

Israel and the ensuing crisis of confidence between Jews and Arabs, two Jewish and

Palestinian Israeli friends from the Galilee, decided to assemble a number of professionalsin the fields of education, social work and organizational consultation. They initiated a

group which would study the discourse of Arab-Jewish Israeli dialogue, and seek ways to

bring some change in the Israeli situation. The two founders recruited all of the group

members. At its height, the group had about 25 members which were comprised of an equal



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number of Jewish and Arab men and women. Each meeting was facilitated and organized

by an Arab and Jewish co-organizer-facilitator, and each session raised issues and subjects

that were decided on by the shifting facilitation team. No outside consultant was hired.

One basic outcome of this group was that most of its members became engaged inongoing Jewish-Arab activities beyond the frame of dialogue groups. For example: young

leadership development among Arab women; a mixed Jewish-Arab school; consolidation

of various non-Jewish community organizations; the resolution of jurisdictional conflicts

between Arab and Jewish villages; the establishment of multi-cultural study groups in

schools, colleges and university; etc.

Through the story of this group, and through the analysis of open-ended interviews with its

members, we can show how they explain the outcomes and characteristics of this group:

1. The group continued meeting for four years;

2. It succeeded in focusing on the primary, hurtful contact points between

Jewish and Palestinian Israelis;

3. It did not engage in politically correct discourse;

4. The group received a contract from the Israeli Police, to conduct a series of

workshops on Jewish-Arab relations at the Police Academy;

5. Separately, most members of the group developed different and empowered

forms of action and work in the domain of Jewish-Arab relations in Israel ;

6. During the process, some basic attitudes were changed while others were not.

This dialogue group was formed quite differently from the typically recognized pattern of

Duki groups. It was a wholly spontaneous organization, neither sponsored nor supported by any of the multiple organizations dealing with/funding/living off the Arab-Jewish

relations in Israel. The group was founded by two friends and colleagues.

This group had no official name. In one of its early meetings, the venue was indicated by

a sheet of white paper, taped to the door of the building where the group was meeting, with



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the words: Forum Walid and an arrow pointing to the room. It is not clear who wrote

this, and why this name was used to identity it. However, from then on, the Forum was

mainly called Forum Walid.

The nature and functioning of this Forum were molded through a series of decisions andsteps, whose reasons were not always clarified and whose consequences were not always

foreseen:

1. First of all, this group was not at all representative of the Israeli society, neither by its

numerical composition (Arabs in Israel amount to about 20% and our group was

roughly composed of half Jews and half Arab/Palestinian Israelis); neither by the

socio-economic level of the members; nor by their political orientation none of the

members are right-wing. The initiators tried to create a group where people from

different sub-groups would be represented. Hence the Arab group was composed of

Christian, Druse and Moslem Arabs and the Jewish group was composed mostly of

secular Sabra (Jewish Israelis born in Israel) participants and two religious people,

both of whom were immigrants from the United States: a conservative rabbi who

arrived in Israel 20 years ago from the United States, and a religious woman,

engaged in philanthropic efforts on behalf of Arab-Jewish relations. There were two

additional immigrants, and the remaining members were native Israelis. The

categorization of the participants is not at all trivial; it has profound roots and

tremendous implications. We will discuss some of those political implications during

the presentation..

2. There was no attempt whatsoever to arrive at a common, or even similar, position

about any issue. There was no thrust towards consensus, and no real place for political correctness. Speech was uncensured. Sometimes we used very sharp

expressions; we did not tinker with what we thought. We used direct speech, and

unambiguous formulas



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3. The Forum was facilitated by two members, in a kind of rotation pattern, every

meeting by two other members, and preferably (and mostly) one Palestinian and one

Jew. As people came from various backgrounds and professional domains, the

consultation-facilitation style shifted from meeting to meeting. Some consultants-facilitators used structured exercises, and others more open sessions; some were

directive, and others more reflective. We believe that these decisions contributed to

the robustness, continuity, and ultimate practicality of this group, as against the

traditional Duki groups.

4. Two main aims were put forward from the beginning: learning from the groups

here and now interaction, learning from the members insights, and learning from

the day-to-day interaction with the external world. Therefore when the first

opportunity arose to work together, we engaged most of the members of the group in

a tentative long-term intervention at the Police Academy. This projects aim was to

humanize the attitude of policemen and policewomen toward the Arab population

in Israel. The most important work was done with the policemen and policewomen

recruited as police officers. Working together in the field intensified the relationships

between the participants and raised issues that were then addressed during the

meetings.

5. The group worked mostly in a dual-ethnic setting (there were only a very small

number of short meetings of homogenous sub groups). The assumption was that

the dynamic of cultural identities can be better understood when they are studied in

their boundaries rather than in their core or essence (Barth 1998 ). Indeed we

believe, also following the traditional Tavistock model, that ethnical/cultural/political identities are not essential entities, rather, they are flexible and

evolving products of interactions in changing contexts and different fields.



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We suppose that the flexible and open setting in which all of the participants felt they

could engage and be responsible one to the other, and to their own feelings of identity -

helped us create an atmosphere of confidence quite rapidly,. Confidence was the basic

component of this potential space created by the group. In this potential space and time, themost difficult issues were dealt with: for instance some of the meetings were held during or

just after the most terrible and bloody events, either of terrorist suicidal attacks in Israel, or

bloody Israeli retaliation or police actions within the occupied territories, or the 9/11

attacks. In those meetings, the participants could play and experiment deeply with the

different components of their own identities.

Following are some reflections about the link between the structural characteristics, the

methodology we applied and the outcomes we achieved.

1. The fact that this group was wholly voluntary, and completely independent of any

establishment , enabled it not to fall into the dynamics of the Israeli reality where

Jews have the position of domination, and thus can either exploit this situation in the

group, or apologize for it, or even worse, deny it. The fact that this group was not a

microcosm of Israeli society enabled an openness that would not have been possible

had the group been entrenched in reality. In fact, it might be said that the

traditional Duki groups, or the general view of a group as a representative of reality

(as in the traditional Tavistock approach) in fact creates an hyperreality

(Baudrillard), in which we actually lose contact with reality, and, in fact, put

ourselves in a situation in which it becomes impossible to change that reality, so that

every thought and action in fact, and paradoxically, reinforce it. This post-modern

condition, following Baudrillard, prevents people to bring forth a change in the post-modern reality, and defuses the radical potential implied in any critical attitude.

2. In our group, we developed the basis of what one member called a new

community . We believe it is more than the typical closeness and sense of common

humanity that usually appear during group dynamics, even when people of opposing



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and estranged positions meet together. There, people usually develop a sympathetic

sensibility which evolves from the mere, novel friction and continuous presence.

They discover that, in fact, all human beings are human beings. But, this is done at

the price of hiding or minimizing the weight of their social/sociological dimension.It is a way - bridging across differences, and meeting on the basic, human level - to

blind oneself to social realities. This is a fundamentally conservative stance, hidden

under sheer liberal humanity, which ultimately entrenches the most inhuman

inequalities and injustices.

This sense of new community cannot either be equated with the feelings

experienced in closed groups, groups of survivors or of those who had had together

the same quasi-magic experience, and who feel that they cannot really communicate

with those that were not there, or who feel estranged from the normal environment,

because of the peculiarity of their experience. The feelings experienced in this group

were those of people who share a quite but not exactly similar - common distrust

concerning the way reality is constructed by the establishment, in government or

political parties or institutionalized activities. This community feels that it is not a

part of the main-stream or establishment, that it has to take a stand and act in order to

change things - not only inside oneself, but especially in the outside world.

3. The puzzle of Identity in a potential space . We, briefly, present here, three reports of

different participants.

In one of the first meeting Samira, an Arab Druse woman angrily expressed

the feeling of being a stranger in her own home. She referred to the fact that

while walking in the forest near her home she sees Jewish tourists occupyingthe area every weekend. One year later in, another context, she sadly expressed

her despair at being identified and labeled as a Druze. It was clear that at this

moment she had enough with the issue of culture and identity. This testimony

exemplifies the tension existing between a political form of self-identity and a



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more complex and personal self-description where more complex issues have

to be considered (for instance, being a woman in a conservative Arab society).

On another occasion, after a trip to Amman, she reported her distress

concerning the limitation of freedom she felt in an Arab country and said thatshe preferred to live in Israel where there is well-established discrimination

against the Arabs, but where she can fully experience personal freedom as a

woman.

David, a Jewish participant, expressed his surprise at seeing that while he

considered himself a radical leftist, he found himself, when confronting the

Arab narratives, defending quite Zionist, if not nationalist standpoints. This

example shows the complexity, and the mutual interdependence of the

processes occurring during the group meetings.

Adam, a religious Jew, discovered the tension existing between Judaism as a

humanistic religion and Judaism as a political assertion for Jewish sovereignty

over the land of Israel. He reflected upon the risk that Jewish sovereignty

might lead to immoral actions (for instance speaking about the transfer of

Arabs from the occupied territories). He asserted that in this case, a radical

separation between Judaism as a religion and Judaism as politics (which

means Zionism) must be carried out. He would probably choose to be a

religious Jew living in pluralistic civil society.

It is interesting to mention that Samira and Adam both asserted that they most

likely would not risk sharing their experiences and reflections with their

neighbors, family, and friends.



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4. From Discourse to Practice.

Most of the people who participated in this dialogue group are now actively engaged in,

if not leading, various projects that concern Arab and Jewish relationships. Some of the participants began their engagement in these activities as a result of the groups work.

Those who were in the field before the group was launched said they engage in their

work with a deeper understanding of the issues in stake, with more articulation, and with

much fewer restrictions. They assert that they have been able to spell out their aims

more clearly because the work we have done together.

5. Instead of a conclusion

The venture we just told you about is not finished. Participants in this group are active in

different projects, some of them are working together, other are separately engaged on

various activities, and continue their ongoing reflection. Most of the people have a warm

feeling toward the group; they feel that the meetings have helped them cross in a

meaningful way through the especially harsh, last four years in Israel,. Participants testify

that the work with the group has helped them sharpen their vision and clarify their own

stands, positions, beliefs, feelings all of which are part of what is commonly considered

as identity.

We can end this report with the words of one of the female participants. She asserted that

now she feels the urge to act and change reality for three reasons:

First, she is very concerned and pessimistic about the rapid degradation of the political

situation. Second, she is optimistic because she feels things can change. Third, she feelsthat she knows better what has to be done in order to bring forth these changes.



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discourse as practice 11.11.04

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