A Visit by the Parent’s Circle Family Forum from Israel/Palestine
“It all started at Johnnie Fox’s”
By Theresa Dillon

On 20 January 2010, twelve members of The Parents’ Circle Family Forum, six Israelis and six Palestinians, travelled from the Middle East to participate in Residential Workshops at Glencree and Belfast.  The purpose of this significant journey, supported and funded by the Department of Foreign Affairs was threefold:

• To participate in, learn from and contribute to the peace building processes
• To focus on victims’ issues as experienced by groups in the Northern Ireland Conflict
• To deepen understanding of their personal journeys through loss and pain to hope and a shared vision of a future built on peace.

Established in 1995, The Parents’ Circle, united by the personal pain of loss and bereavement resulting from the Israel/Palestine Conflict, hope to breach the wall of hatred by pursuing solutions to this conflict based on peace and reconciliation.
David Bloomfield, Glencree CEO, warmly welcomed the group to Glencree, outlined its history and provided a context for the peace agreement in Northern Ireland by explaining the historical backdrop.

Glencree provided the safe space and opportunity for each individual to speak about and share their personal story of pain and loss and their journey to membership of the Parents’ Circle and what they hope to achieve through membership of this remarkable organisation.

Brilliantly facilitated by project coordinator Wilhelm Verwoerd and facilitator Alistair Little these moving, powerful and important sessions provided the ideal opportunity to question, probe, reflect and explore programmes for action that can contribute to peaceful ways forward while embracing the respective vision of both Palestinians and Israelis.
The Saturday afternoon and evening programmes brought a particular depth of understanding to the reality of pain, loss and hope when a group from the Sustainable Peace Network – Annie Bowman, Don Browne, Gerard McErlane, Carolanne Browne and Alistair Little - joined the Parents’ Circle to share their stories of personal loss and transforming violent conflict during the course of the Conflict in and about Northern Ireland.  The reciprocity of openness, generosity and connectedness between the groups created a renewed sense of understanding and commitment to peace building.

It was a busy schedule in Armagh and Belfast for The Parents Circle.  Here the emphasis focused on an exchange of experiences and views with SAVER-NAVER (South/North Armagh Victims Encouraging Recognition); The Disabled Police Officers Association of Northern Ireland and Relatives for Justice as well as a tour of West Belfast.

Across all three distinctive group gatherings the common denominator linking each was the shared experience of pain, loss and bereavement. Again the common theme of unity evidenced was the unshakeable view that the pursuit of peace and peace building across traditional divides was the only way in which to nurture and be nurtured, to respect and be respected to grow and become an authentic individual in an authentic community.

A social highpoint of the visit to Belfast was a lovely evening at the home of Susan McEwen (IPC Co-ordinator at Corrymeela) who along with her husband Johnny hosted a wonderful supper with music and song.

The value and importance of the visit to the island of Ireland by the Parents’ Circle cannot be understated.  The workshops, meetings and exchanges enabled each individual to speak, question, argue, disagree, reflect, learn and journey inward to a deepened understanding of purpose and place.  By journeying inward renewed commitment to peace and reconciliation was directed outwards – outwards towards each other and towards the community groups with whom they shared time and thought. 

Perhaps one of the most delightful observable moments was watching others watch in disbelief as a group of Palestinians and Israelis, united in purpose, shared an evening of music and song.  The slow dawning of this reality was best encapsulated by the beaming musician whose parting words as the group left were “Don’t forget, it all started at Johnnie Fox’s”.

A tree planting ceremony to mark the end of the visit at Glencree took place on January 24. It is a tribute to a wonderful group of people – Ali, Rami, Robi, Seham, Mohammed, Osama, Aesha, Ayelet, Niv, Suheir, Guy and Fida – united in their vision of peace of reconciliation and in the symbolism of planting seeds we display our solidarity as the Parents’ Circle journey to harvest their vision.