Welcome

Thanks for taking an interest in my upcoming Monash University trip to Israel and the Palestinian Territories. I have been working on the itinerary for several months and making contact with the other facilitators as well as the students. They'll be about 30 of us on the trip, mainly undergraduate students. We'll all get a deeper appreciation of the challenges facing the Jewish and Palestinian people building a future of peace. I have lived in Jerusalem for 4 years (both our children were born there) and I have been to Bethlehem and Hebron with Encounter- a wondeful organisation that takes Jews from the diaspora (and now also Israeli Jews) to Palestinian cities to meet people and  learn about their lives and their stories (Deep gratitude to Rabbi Melissa Weintraub and Illana Sumka). My experiences on those trips have been central to my thinking about this one. One of my heroes, Rabbi Michael Melchior said that nowadays we can't choose between Jews and Palestinians but that if we love and want peace we need to choose both. I don't have a clear idea of what choosing both amounts to in practical terms but it is a direction in which to approach this trip and all people we meet. We'll be processing our experiences in dyads, smaller groups and at times in the large group. This is a journey of the spirit. What happens when we enter conflict-ridden spaces with open-heartedness and compassion. It is a journey also of the inside. I've lost my voice. My friend and teacher Jasmine Lance gave me a reading that evoked a sense of me giving up some old battles, finding my power in new/old places and residing in the place of feeling, going inside and taking inspiration from natural beauty.