Please Pass the Peace

A good meal is one of the most pleasurable activities of man. It nourishes, satisfies, and puts man in a peaceful mood; where a smile and a gentler disposition is the result of a dish exquisitely prepared and elegantly served. This is an insight all chefs have known and all mothers throughout the history of mankind have been practicing. The lack of food due to natural calamities or war is always a tragedy; and seldom, if ever, was food used as an instrument of peace. Not anymore. People from either side of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict are working together, using their best culinary traditions and their deadliest utensils- knives- not to stab nor kill each other, but to create fine meals for a food festival for peace.

These are chefs who belong to the Chefs for Peace association whose members are indifferent to politics, religion or color. They are aware that the distrust and absence of mutual respect between people of these different warring faiths is the fundamental obstacle towards moving forward in the peace process. They realize that culinary practices of Greeks, Turkish, Jewish and Palestinians have more similarities and borrow from each other; and it is in the interest in food and culinary opportunities that will bring people to experience coexistence, mutual respect, and living in peace after being long separated by partisan circumstances. The approach is Peace Meal but effective.

The Chefs for Peace was established in 2001 by an Armenian Christian Kevork Alemian, and the group now boasts of 45 chefs composed of Arabs, Muslims, Israelis, and Christians. The group chose Jerusalem as its base since it is the center of the three monotheistic faiths. They know that no authentic development can take place and no future for their children will evolve unless there is peace in the region. Their focus is on human relations using the common denominator of food and cooking traditions as a venue to communicate, understand and accept. They cook for peace, it is a concept of sharing meals rooted in biblical traditions of breaking bread together. It is share the stew, not shock and awe; it is live in peace not blown to pieces; it is merge and serve, not attack and surge.

This association of culinary professionals hold food festivals for peace several times in a month and are open to invitations from people anywhere in the world. They have yet to experience a failed cook for peace event. Politicians and peace negotiators can learn several things from these chefs, since what they've been cooking up for the last several decades have not been palatable to the Middle Eastern states and communities. The difference lies in both the ingredients and intentions. Using weapons of destruction will not build confidence but fear, and an intent to take versus an intent to share will surely be met with a hostile response. These will lead to a raw deal, not to a good meal.

Why this formula of the chefs hasn't dawned on the Heads of State of powerful nations and warring states is beyond comprehension. Perhaps the future of mankind will be saved if all heads of state were themselves cooks or chefs. Then maybe we can have better slogans like "Make soups, not nukes".As it is, the problem with these heads is that they only know how to cook up schemes that will further the interest of their friends and cronies; stir up wars in other countries through manipulation and intrigue and take advantage of the chaos for their own ends; and serve lies and lip service to cover their tracks. Somebody please pass them the peace!

Haaarrrrwwwwk...Twoooooph...Ting!

Gap in Gaza's Ghetto

Palestinians may soon realize that the breach in the wall erected by Israel is more than a physical gap. It has evolved into a potential flash point that would affect both the Arab countries, Israel and Western democracies that supported its construction, passively or actively, and those that have benefited by using it against Israel without actually getting into a firefight in the process. The huge and ugly walls that enclosed the infertile desert strip on 3 sides, save for the Southern borders, have allowed Israel to cut off supplies of fuel, electricity, water and food; raising humanitarian issues against the state. The breach provided Palestinians a respite from being trapped and helpless, only to be replaced by an invisible wall that would have undefinable boundaries and invisible barriers, marked only by the pain of a bullet, the horror of an explosion, or the misery of isolation.

Israel has decided to disengage from Gaza, and it has proved to be a disastrous one. The decision is the logical conclusion of releasing its responsibility of providing services to a territory ruled by a group dedicated to its obliteration. But the disengagement took a turn for the worse. It eliminated Israel's capability to monitor and gather intelligence information in the area, resulting in the successful infiltration by Al Qaida. It has also allowed Iran to spread its reach and influence in another part of the Middle East, weakening western influence in the region. Iran's Ahmadinejad now hosts the Kuwaiti foreign minister and has seen the potential in the shift of the balance of power in the region. The increasing power and influence of Iran has made Saudi Arabia and Egypt wary of confronting their neighbor.

Since 1948, Egypt refused the setting up of a Palestinian state in Gaza but used it as a base for their Fedayeen raids on Israel. Their iron fisted policies prevented Palestinians from entering Egypt, but their main objective seemed to be the use of Palestinians as shield against counter attacks from Israel. In 1982, Egypt took back Sinai but refused Gaza, leaving it as Israel's responsibility. Throughout the 1980's and 1990's however, it used Gaza as a means to confront and tear down Israel's legitimacy while publicly espousing humanitarian needs. The entry of terrorists and new sets of arsenal inside Gaza resulting from the breach may pose problems for both Israel and Egypt. However, Egypt's policies over the last 6 decades will be poetic justice if they continue to refuse to take responsibility for the fate of the Palestinians. Had Egypt accepted Arab refugees as Israel did by accepting Jewish refugees from Arab countries, things would have been much more stable. Today, the aging Egyptian leader has become more vulnerable in this potentially explosive situation.

The Hamas group that controls Gaza's Palestinian population will undoubtedly get support from Egypt by way of supplies and consumer necessities in the form of humanitarian assistance, but it would be naive for the Hamas to believe that invoking Muslim Brotherhood would result in Egypt's embracing of Palestinians in the name of Arab Unity. Egypt will pay lip service, that's as far as it goes. There will never be an Egypt-Hamas Brotherhood Alliance for this poor distant cousin.

And where will this leave the rest of the Palestinians? The unrestrained enthusiasm that accompanied their temporary release from confinement will become a fond memory of momentary freedom under anarchistic circumstances. Their fate as a people will be demolished by interests more powerful than they are, the status in the barren strip will be elevated from mendicants to hostages, and their dream of a sovereign state will revert to a nightmare they may never awake from.

Haaarrrwwwwk...Twoooooph...Ting!