CURRENT SITUATION

In Israel, the protests against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have been going on for about ten weeks now, accusing him of corruption, fraud and abuse of power.
On August 13th, Israel and the United Arab Emirates signed the “Abraham Accords Peace Agreement: Treaty of Peace, Diplomatic Relations and Full Normalization Between the United Arab Emirates and the State of Israel”. These two countries established bilateral agreements concerning all relevant sectors ranging from investments and tourism to telecommunication and security. In exchange, Netanyahu put on hold the annexation of some parts of the West Bank. As a consequence, the President of the Palestinian Authority Abu Mazen withdrew the diplomatic representative in Abu Dhabi.
This agreement between the two countries underlines how much the Palestinian issue is being set aside and loosing importance within international geopolitics: if previously the necessary condition was the creation of a Palestinian State, now the promise not to proceed with the annexation of West Bank’s parts is sufficient.

Numb:
Beirut seems enveloped in a gray torpor, and with it those who live it.
The first few days we struggle to recognize the city, which is usually very hectic and chaotic.
The streets are empty and full of glasses on the ground, even in areas very far from the explosion.
People try to smile, but the weariness they drag on is perceivable.
And it infects us.
We do not make any particular efforts during the day, but when we return home in the evening we always feel so tired and we do not understand the reason why.
“We go around and see the signs of death, we smell her. Let's pretend that this is all normal, but it is not”.

In the last few days we have been in Beirut, as volunteers for Operazione Colomba. We are working alongside young people who gathered in solidarity networks in order to bring food, medicines, and assistance to those who have been left alone in the reconstruction process.
Let’s support them!

“This area was the blossom of the city, a blossom in the heart of Beirut. And now, look at it…”
Those are the words of a man from Tripoli who is not seeing his family since one year, since he moved down to Beirut to work in the construction site where he also lives.
The site was right in front of the place where we met him; now he’s sitting next to a small coffee  shop and stares at the building. It is still standing but it is quite damaged and nobody knows when the works will start again.

We first met Mussab on a long and troubled day. He was at the hospital in one of the poorest and most marginalized districts in Tripoli, a town in the north of Lebanon.
It took us a very long time, many efforts and strong determination, but in the end Mussab was granted the possibility to come to Italy, in Genoa, to cure his serious disease. This was possible thanks to a network of solidarity composed by dozens of people and organizations. This is a story of courage, strong will, and change. What we share with you here is another chapter of this wonderful story…

Today Muss, as we now call him, has ended his career at the lower secondary school with an online presentation in front of us, his teachers, who had tailored the questions to suit him. He held the presentation in such a brilliant and involving way that we were really moved and were left speechless, so that we felt unable to say goodbye at the end.
The title of his presentation was “No more wars” and it started with a quotation from an Italian song “C’era una volta la mia vita, c’era una volta la mia casa, c’era una volta e voglio che sia ancora” (Il mio nome è mai più, Jovanotti, Pelù, Ligabue) .
We were his teachers for 2 years, and these were 2 special years for us.

Only a pandemic could bring “doves”, the volunteers from Operazione Colomba (Operation Dove), back to Italy. We were forced to interrupt our physical presence with the people we share our life with, which was a painful and unexpected split we could have never thought of.

We have tried in every possible way to transform this pain in hope by being near to the people we usually accompany and protect in the conflicts around the world, we have kept giving them a voice in their nonviolent protest for peace and justice. After all, we are “doves” everywhere we go, and a “dove” cannot simply stare at the needs of the weak, whether they are victims of war, poverty, or of a virus. That is why so many of us chose to act in a different way. We can build peace through solidarity, community bonds and an answer to the urgent matters of a wounded humanity.

Now we have decided to share with you what being a “dove” during Covid19 felt like: people acted in different ways and different contexts, but we were all united by our shared experience on the ground as a Nonviolent Peace Corps.

This is our first story, by Christopher and Anna. The following stories will be published on our Facebook page.