LF_080918

LakeForestLeader.com LIFE & ARTS
the lake forest leader | August 9, 2018 | 21
Palestinian-American tour
guide delivers hopeful message
Katie Copenhaver
Freelance Reporter
Members of the St.
James Lutheran Church
of Lake Forest are getting
ready for a private trip to
Israel this October with
MEJDI Tours. This will
be their second trip with
the tour company, which is
co-owned by a Palestinian
man and a Jewish man and
uses the tag line, “a global
movement of people using
business as a force for
good.”
In advance of the trip,
the Palestinian owner Aziz
Abu Sarah held a presentation
and discussion titled
Breaking Down the Walls
that Divide Sunday, Aug. 5
at the church.
“It’s extremely rare for
a Jew and a Palestinian to
own a business together,”
Sarah said. “Our friendship
has taken us to all
these places in the world to
do conflict resolution,” he
explained in regard to his
partnership with co-owner
Scott Cooper.
Sarah’s presentation
was partly educational
and partly reassuring
given that the group will
be traveling to both Jewish
and Palestinian areas
of Israel amid the recent
unrest over the American
recognition of Jerusalem
as Israel’s capital city and
the July passage of a Jewish
nation-state law by the
country’s legislature.
MEJDI, which is based
in the United States, partners
with United Nations
subgroups, National Geographic,
diplomatic agencies
and religious organizations
and uses local tour
guides to offer both custom
and open trips to not
Aziz Abu Sarah discusses recent current events and
their impact on peace throughout the globe Sunday,
Aug. 5 at St. James Lutheran Church of Lake Forest.
Claire Esker/22nd Century Media.
only Israel, but also other
Middle Eastern nations,
Europe, Central America
and Asia.
Sarah, who grew up in
Jerusalem and in the past
10 years relocated and
became a United States
citizen, is also a National
Geographic Explorer
and TED Fellow. He has
worked for the U.S. State
Department and other diplomatic
agencies to help
resolve conflicts around
the world. That work has
taken him to Colombia,
Syria, Afghanistan, Guatemala
and elsewhere.
When asked by an audience
member if he gets
nervous during some of his
travels, Sarah said, “I was
shot at the first time when
I was 7. If you grow up in
a conflict zone, you learn
how to deal with it. You
are not as scared going into
other conflict zones.”
He also said of his successes
in conflict resolution,
“If you are able to
connect people who want
to shoot each other, you
can connect anyone.”
He said the key is for
people to get to know each
other by sharing their personal
narratives of struggle.
“Stories are the key to
changing people’s hearts
and minds,” he explained.
“We have to see a human,
not a number.”
Sarah described his tour
company as a force for
social and environmental
change. They teach attendees
about the local people
they are visiting in hopes
it will bring greater understanding
and tolerance.
In turn, they encourage
municipalities and nations
to clean up polluted areas
and to enact tougher laws
against poaching wildlife
in order to attract more
tourism.
St. James Pastor Richard
Holmer said this October’s
tour will mark his third trip
to Israel.
“We see it as a real opportunity
because Lutherans
have a limited presence
in Israel.”
He noted that the Lutheran-run
Augusta Victoria
Hospital, which sits on
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