Combatants for Peace Sulaiman Khatib and Avner Wishnitzer

We are a group of former Israeli soldiers and formerly imprisoned Palestinians. Our work is a model for the nonviolent way forward.

Hamas’s attack on Israel and Israel’s ongoing assault on Gaza have already caused colossal destruction and anguish. Some 1,200 Israelis were killed by Hamas on October 7. In the more than six weeks since, at least 13,000 people, according to some estimates, have been killed in Gaza by the Israeli army. Fear and hatred are everywhere here. Overwhelmed by grief and anger, both Israelis and Palestinians fail—and often refuse—to recognize the pain and humanity of those on the other side. If the enemy is less than human, no political solution is possible. But it is precisely the collapse of the belief in a solution, and the dehumanization that accompanied it, that got us here to begin with. We need not only a real peace process but a project of dehumanization to support it. What could that project entail?