From mainstream news headlines it seems Iran and Israel are on the edge of war. Israeli politicians continue to threaten [1] attacking Iranian nuclear facilities and Iranian authorities recite [2] their old slogans that Israel will ‘disappear from the map.’
But as the noise of war rises from both sides, so does activism for peace.
Recently, Israelis demonstrated [1] for peace in their capital city of Tel Aviv and used the Internet to send a ‘no to war’ message.
[3]“So once again, load and clear, we are saying NO to this war.” From the Israeli-Loves-Iran Facebook campaign.
Peace lovers also continue to join a Facebook page [4] that was launched on March 19, 2012 by Israeli Pushpin Mehina (also known as Ronny) that tells Iranians, ‘Israelis love you and will not bomb your country. [5]‘ The page currently has more than 70,000 likes. On the same day, Iranians launched the Facebook page ‘From Iran for Peace and Democracy [6]‘, which soon started a campaign to tell Israelis, “We are your friends [7].”
Both campaigns came together again when the Iranian [8] page reposted the following message from the Israeli [9] Facebook page:
We are millions of people who will be hurt. Will be drafted, will have to fight, lose our lives, our relatives. We, parents from TelAviv and Tehran will have to run with our children to the shelters and pray the missiles will miss us.But they will fall somewhere, on someone. These last few days the sound of war is becoming louder. So once again, load and clear, we are saying NO to this war. We saying to the people of Iran: We Love You.
On Wednesday, August 16th, over 400 people, including university professors and human rights defenders, signed an online petition calling [10]on Israeli pilots to refuse to bomb Iran, if they are ordered to do so.
The online petition reads [11]:
the pilots we regard a decision to launch an attack on Iran as a highly mistaken gamble, which would entail severe risks for the State of Israel and would not solve the basic problem. As already mentioned, even the best operational success would not stop the Iranian nuclear program but only delay it – and for this temporary delay all of us would have to pay an exorbitant price, possibly a terrible one. You, the Air Force pilots – more than anyone else – have in your hands the real power to avert this disaster.