Israelis, Palestinians plan peace campaign

Jordan Times, Friday, June 11, 2004

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM (AP) — It might be a hard sell after more than three years of bloody violence, but Israeli and Palestinian advertisers are going to try to convince their people that peace is a good bargain. Ever optimistic about the power of marketing strategies, advertisers, journalists and animators traveled to Jordan Thursday to plan a media peace campaign.

Diplomatic moves have stalled during the conflict, in which 2,942 people have been killed on the Palestinian side and 964 on the Israeli side.

Also, because of the violence, interaction between ordinary people on the two sides has almost disappeared.

Most Palestinians, who used to work and shop in Israel almost without restrictions, are banned for security reasons, because of hundreds of attacks in Israel by Palestinian resistance fighters, including suicide bombings.

The military banned Israelis from entering Palestinian areas after Palestinians killed several Israelis who crossed into the West Bank for shopping or business. The only Israelis seen by Palestinians these days are soldiers and Jewish settlers.

The 20 Israeli and 20 Palestinian participants — including senior people from top advertising companies — hope to present average people on each side with the stories and feelings of the other, to counter negative stereotypes. Among the ideas are television talk shows, mass media campaigns and songs in Arabic and Hebrew.

"The idea is to think about how to create an environment that allows us to build peace," said Doron Sternschuss, owner of the Israeli branch of the advertising company, Euro RSCG. "We usually sit to think up creative business ideas, but our business ideas today are creative peace ideas." International advertising firms have also expressed interest and may take any campaign abroad to other conflict areas, said Ron Pundak, director of Israel's Peres Centre for Peace, named after Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shimon Peres.

The campaign will not offer diplomatic solutions. The focus will be average people from both sides talking about daily hardships and hope for the future, Pundak said.

"We believe that the two constituencies are ripe for the change and are in full comprehension that change is needed," Pundak said.

Earth, a planet hungry for peace

The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers (Ran Cohen, pmc, 5/24/03).

The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers in the West Bank, like a Python (Alquds, 1/25/03.

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