In March, Ayala Shalev joined the Encompass team as our new Israeli coordinator. Welcome to the team Ayala! In this article, Ayala reflects on what motivates her as an educator and peace activist:

“My name is Ayala Shalev and I was born and raised in Tel-Aviv, Israel. I now living in Kfar-Saba, in the Sharon area. I’m kind of a free thinker, so my path is never straight… professionally I’m a copywriter, my heart and my masters degree are in education, and I see myself always walking on the line that is educational and social, intertwined.

I’ve been a peace activist for more than a decade. I think, the way Israel has been conducting itself along this time, I couldn’t be living here unless I was doing that – this is what motivates me. I want to see an open, non-occupying, non-oppressing Israel, and that’s what I fight for.

So I’m always involved, always active. To mention the “big chunks” – I was an educational project manager in the bereaved families forum for two years; I was content manager and then led the Israeli-Palestinian memorial day ceremony for six years (2018-2023); I was the Israeli regional manager in Hands of Peace for 3 years. And a lot more on top of that.

On Oct 7 2023 we woke up at about 7am, jumping out of bed to the sound of the siren, totally clueless to what is going on, scared and confused. It took days until the horrors of what had happened could be grasped; and then the attack on Gaza started and more horrors came, and are still coming.

Personally – the daughter of a childhood friend of mine was murdered in the Nova party; One of my Hands of Peace participants from 2022 was kidnapped and is still held by the attackers who took her. Not a day goes by that I don’t think of her; One of my daughter’s friends was also kidnapped and then murdered in Gaza by those attackers; And I have friends, activists, who lost dozens of family members in Gaza in the ongoing Israeli bombings. It is all very complicated, still ongoing, and very very hard.

This horror we’re living now only strengthened my understanding that violence is never ever a solution, and the only thing it brings is more violence. There is no military (violent) solution to this conflict, so the efforts have to be towards treaties and agreements with the moderate countries in the area. It can be done, if the Israeli government will want to do it.

And it also strengthens my realisation of the very problematic local peacebuilding orgs and how they work. The opportunities for young Palestinians and Israelis to meet are getting rarer and rarer and that is the most important role that overseas peacebuilding orgs play right now. It’s hard to explain to people from outside how come we live an hour away but we can’t meet – but this is the reality. So to begin with, this is a huge role.

My country has become a very violent, ultra-right, almost dangerous place to live in. Being an activist and a peacebuilder is probably the only justification for me to keep on living here.

You know, people here have stopped asking “how are you” when we meet. Because you can’t really say “fine” and go on, because nothing is fine.

To try and cope, I stay aware of myself in the situation. I don’t watch the news, which is very pro-government. I surround myself with friends, people that I have caring relationships. I find escapism routes to let the mind rest, like stupid Netflix series. I keep balanced like that. 

I think peace is easy to achieve {: (I really do). All the solutions are on the table, and there are all kinds of possibilities. The problem now is that people need to want to make peace – and that means education. If I were minister of education, I would educate towards universal values of inclusion, of human rights, of equality and so on. That will make people think different and act different than now, when the system educates to Jewish supremacy, to hating and dehumanising “others”, and to violence as solutions.”