Oslo

This past Sunday, I went to see Oslo, a play about the peace accords, at the Lincoln Center theater. For three hours I was absolutely riveted watching as the Oslo peace process unfolded. I knew some, but not all of the history, and the amazing efforts on behalf of the Norwegians to broker a peace accord in the Middle East between 1992 and 1993. What I did not know (though it came as no surprise) is the arduous process to teach a compromise between Israel and the Palestinians-how many people it took, how much dissent. The joy of the play was seeing how strong and emphatic each side of the political divide was, yet how much they were able to bond over FOOD and DRINK-the universal language. At the end of the day, Uri Savir, the Director-General of the Foreign Ministry, and Hassan Asfour, the official liaison with the Palestinian Delegation at multilateral US-sponsored talks, became the pivotal players who made these accords happen. During one poignant moment, both men discover they have daughters and end up embracing in their love for their daughters back home, and also because both men want the bloodshed, the challenges to cease. After much haggling back and forth, this accord is eventually signed, when Simon Peres negotiates with Arafat and his extended clan over the phone. For one miraculous moment in time, peace was reached, but it has been tenuous and fragile every since. That is the despair of the situation. The beautiful moment? Asfour and Savir, a Palestinian and an Israeli, have been friends ever since this historic time in 1993.