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fateful relations, both past and future, with the Palestinians in the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and
the Galilee?

When the clouds of colored smoke dissipate from the politicians' claims of sweeping and decisive
victory; when we discover the actual achievements of this operation, and how far they are from
what we really need in order to live a normal life here; when we finally admit that a whole country
eagerly hypnotized itself, because it needed so badly to believe that Gaza would cure it of Lebanon-
itis - maybe then we will settle accounts with those who, time after time, incite the Israeli public,
whipping them into a frenzy of arrogance and a euphoria of power. Those who have taught us over
the years to scoff at belief in peace and any hope for change in our relations with the Arabs. Those
who have convinced us that the Arabs understand only force, and therefore that is the only
language we can use in our dealings with them.

And because we have spoken to them for so long in that language, and that language alone, we have
forgotten that there are other languages for speaking to human beings, even to enemies, even
bitter foes like Hamas - languages that are as much our mother tongue as the language of planes
and tanks.

We must speak to the Palestinians: That is the most important conclusion from the most recent
round of bloodshed. We must speak also to those who do not recognize our right to exist here.
Instead of ignoring Hamas at this time, we would do better to take advantage of the new reality
that has been created by beginning a dialogue with them immediately, one that would allow us to
reach an accord with the whole of the Palestinian people. We must speak to them and begin to
acknowledge that reality is not one hermetic story that we, and the Palestinians, too, have been
telling ourselves for generations. Reality is not just the story we are locked into, a story made up, in
no small measure, of fantasies, wishful thinking and nightmares.

We must speak to them, and create, within this closed-off, deaf reality, the very possibility for
speech. We must create this alternative, so mocked and maligned today, which in the tempest of
war has almost no place, no hope, no believers.

We must speak to them as part of a calculated strategy. We must initiate speech, insist on speech,
let no one put us off. We must speak, even if dialogue seems hopeless from the start. In the long
run, this stubbornness will contribute much more to our security than hundreds of planes dropping
bombs on a city and its inhabitants.

We must speak out of understanding, born as we look out at the horrible devastation, as we grasp
that the harm we are capable of inflicting on each other, each people in its own way, is so enormous
and so destructive and so utterly senseless, that if we surrender to it and accept its logic, it will
end up destroying us all.

We must speak, because what has happened in the Gaza Strip over the last few weeks sets up a
mirror in which we in Israel see the reflection of our own face - a face that, if we were looking in
from the outside or saw it on another people - would leave us aghast. We would see that our victory
is not a genuine victory, and that the war in Gaza has not healed the spot that so badly needs a
cure, but only further exposed the tragic and never-ending mistakes we have made in navigating our
way.