To build a better tomorrow, we must talk across political divisions

When the community of Peace People was founded in Northern Ireland close to 50 years ago, we wrote that we would “dedicate ourselves to working with our neighbors, near and far, day in and day out, to build that peaceful society in which the tragedies we have known are a bad memory and a continuing warning.” Our goals were simple enough: to break through the personal and political divisions that too often separate progressive people to create direct paths to peacebuilding through dialogue.

Though so much has changed over the past decades, peacemakers the world over have been heartened to hear similar sentiments toward simple connections between people echoed in the words of Terumi Tanaka, co-founder of Japan’s Nihon Hidankyo, or the Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers, at this year’s Nobel Peace Prize ceremony. “In our founding declaration,” he said, we “expressed our determination to ‘save humanity from its crisis through the lessons learned from our experiences, while at the same time saving ourselves.’”

The mutually respectful conversations across language, culture and religion found in Palestine among the Combatants for Peace and other groups follow along a parallel path. “We do not seek to deny our violent past but rather work with it, process it, and turn it from a site of conflict into a basis for joint, constructive action,” wrote the Palestinian and Israeli Peace Combatants in their most recent Call for their Joint Nakba Commemoration Ceremony. Looking to define “liberation” for our time, they pondered “how do we begin to heal from our past and present trauma? How do we liberate ourselves from occupation, oppression and violence?”

Today, at a time of great crisis and change, we write from Belfast and New York in continued and consistent urgency for peace with justice, through dialogue and direct peacebuilding. As lifelong peacemakers, we have never stopped seeking opportunities to exchange with the very peoples we may be in conflict with — finding more often than not that on the grassroots and local levels, all people want the simple truths of human rights and an end to violence and conflict.

We are deeply opposed to the Russian war in Ukraine, and distraught by the massive destruction in Ukraine and loss of life in both countries. But we are also not comfortable with Russophobia or the expansion of NATO as a response to the conflict. There are impressive grassroots efforts within both Russia and the Ukraine to end the war and return to what some have called a “perpetual peace” that has existed between both peoples for many centuries. Bold civil resistance in Ukraine against the occupation and growing war resistance in Russia deserve more international attention and solidarity. No formal peace can be negotiated without the full participation of both states in conflict; no group of militarists can be saviors of the people or leaders of lasting peace.

We are worried and concerned that a Trump-led imperial agenda can only lead to continued conflict, perhaps mostly in other parts of the world. Our histories are centered in an understanding that colonialism, like its imperial father and neocolonial cousin, is itself an act of great violence, a crime against humanity.

Therefore, we especially oppose the intensification of militarism and incursions of the settler-colonial Zionist apartheid state of Israel, supported by different tactical approaches but with the same political and military fervor from both major U.S. political parties. We support freedom for the people of Palestine and watch with horror as the early stages of a ceasefire agreement are followed by talk of a U.S. takeover of Palestinian Gaza.

Unlike some in the U.S. and elsewhere, we do not see the world fundamentally divided between Republican and Democrat, between good and evil, or even between an infallible right and wrong. Neighbors have to be more forgiving of one another, and social scientists and activists — especially ones seeking peace with justice — have to understand the nuances that appear to separate us but need not keep us divided. The Community of Peace People of Northern Island was founded on dialogue between Catholics and Protestants; our friends in Palestine include Muslims, Jews and Christians; around the world we unite with people of all faiths, ideologies and backgrounds. 

We cannot disagree that a “revolution of common sense” is needed in the world. We are simply unwilling to give Donald Trump the benefit of the doubt that he can or will lead such a positive transformation, despite his rhetoric. We cannot dispute the excitement that surrounded the election of Barak Obama in 2008, but we were unwilling to give him the benefit of the doubt that he deserved the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize before even taking action as president. We are frankly more aligned with the rich histories and experiences of Nobel Peace laureates Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa and former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, both of whom led long lives struggling for justice — and both of whom were clear that Israeli policy toward Palestine was an act of apartheid.

For Palestine and for all still-colonized people living under occupation — for Puerto Rico and Kurdistan/Rojava, for Western Sahara and West Papua, for all oppressed people of the world, and all those living amid genocide, war and the causes of war — we call for freedom with dignity, for full and immediate liberation, for a true revolution of the common people. In this time of great crisis and change, we work and pray for the tragedies of our era to become bad memories and continued warnings. Our work is as it ever has been: to nonviolently campaign for an end to the conflicts before us, to stand in solidarity with those most in need, and to dialogue with our neighbors — even those we seem to disagree with — to build a better tomorrow for our children.