An organization of Israeli and Palestinian parents who have lost loved ones in the current conflict has launched a new campaign calling for peace and reconciliation. At a time when Israelis and Palestinians seem farther apart than ever before, the bereaved parents say there is no military solution and that it is better to "have pains of peace than the agonies of war."

The Bereaved Families' Forum, an organization comprised of 190 Israeli families and nearly 140 Palestinian families, launched its media campaign last week. The campaign has a budget of a million dollars and is financed by American and European government organizations, according to the terms of the Israeli-Palestinian peace accords, which provide funding for regional peace campaigns, Maariv reported.

Advertisements have appeared in the Israeli press and

"We are trying to advance the idea of reconciliation between two peoples" - Yitzhak Frankenthal

the campaign's slogan has filled billboards alongside Israeli highways. Plans call for a similar campaign in Arabic in the Palestinian press and in various locations in the territories.

"It is very dramatic that [PA Chairman Yasser] Arafat has agreed to the posting of these signs in the territories," said Shmuelik Cohen, strategic adviser to the Forum and manager of its current campaign. "Actually, these posters are against the Hamas and against the Jihad," he pointed out.

The Forum's previous slogan, "Only Peace will win," was "suitable to a time of peace, and problematic because it can have different interpretations," Cohen said. The new slogan is attributed to former Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who reportedly used it when speaking to a group of Likud Party members in 1992. Others attribute the saying to Menachem Begin who voiced it in 1981.

"Instead of turning to revenge, hatred and hostilities, we are trying to advance the idea of reconciliation between two peoples," said Yitzhak Frankenthal, chairman and founder of the Forum. "The goal of the campaign is to remember, and to remind leaders that it is possible to return to the negotiations table."

"Nothing will bring back our sons, but we want peace"
Frankenthal's son Arik, then a 19-year-old soldier, was killed by Palestinians in 1994 while hitchhiking in the West Bank. Instead of urging revenge, Frankenthal wrote a letter to then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, telling him that it was absolutely essential to come to an agreement with the Palestinians. Frankenthal wrote that his son had died because no one had done what was necessary to make peace.

Shortly afterwards, Frankenthal formed a support group for bereaved parents who had lost children during the conflict with the Palestinians, but who still supported the peace process. Roni Hirshenson was one parent who answered Frankenthal's invitation. Hirshenson's 19-year-old son, Amir, was killed by a suicide bomber at Beit Lid in January 1995. "He (Amir) was always a supporter of the peace process, like me," Hirshenson said.

"Nothing will bring back my son, but we meet because we want peace," said Mohammed Najiv, a Palestinian resident of Beit Lahiya in the Gaza Strip who lost his 18-year-old son, Ashraf, in 1996 after a gun battle with Israeli soldiers.

Israeli families turned back at IDF roadblock
A group of Israeli families was not permitted to pass through the IDF roadblock at Kalandiya last week and meet with Arafat in Ramallah. "The bereaved families sent us a request regarding their plans to enter Ramallah as part of their support campaign," said Yarden Vatikai, spokesman for Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer. "The Defense Ministry and the IDF bar Israelis from entering areas under PA security control because of the dangers of entering Area A."

"Everyone knows what the final agreement means and the price to be paid, but both peoples will only reach that conclusion after others suffer a similar fate to mine," said Rami Elhanan, whose daughter, Smadar, was killed in a suicide bombing in Jerusalem's Ben-Yehuda pedestrian mall four years ago. "I believe that it will happen some day. That is what motivates me to continue campaigning -- the belief that people will eventually have to come to terms and realize they must live side by side on the same land."

At a time when closures keep Palestinian families in their homes and the IDF bars Israeli access to Palestinian territories, most of the connection between the Israeli and Palestinian families of the Forum is by telephone. According to Frankenthal, in two weeks' time, ten Israeli families and ten Palestinian families will meet on neutral ground in Europe.

The Forum wants "the Israeli and Palestinian publics to press their leaders to sit down and reach a peace agreement," he said. Frankenthal, who met with Arafat earlier this month, said "there is a specific instruction from Arafat allowing bereaved Palestinian families to work with us."

"Behind every coffin, there is a person"
A previous campaign organized by the Bereaved Families' Forum received heavy coverage in the media due to its controversial nature. In October, the group positioned more than 900 mock coffins in Tel Aviv's Rabin Square, representing the Palestinians and Israelis killed in the latest cycle of violence. The display was intended, in the group's words, "to bring home the human toll of the past year's clashes between Israelis and Palestinians."

''Behind every coffin, there is a person, a human being,'' Frankenthal said. ''When I see the white coffins, I remember my son. That is very difficult for me."

Organizers had planned to cover the mock coffins with Israeli and Palestinian flags. Tel Aviv police ruled out the display of the Palestinian flags, saying this disturbed the peace and that they could not protect the display against those who would seek to destroy it. The Forum petitioned the High Court of Justice to allow the Palestinian flags, but withdrew the petition at the request of Justice Michael Heshin, who presided over a three-judge panel at a hearing on the case.

Frankenthal said the Forum has now submitted a new petition to the High Court to permit it to use Palestinian flags in a future display of the mock coffins.

Light at the end of the tunnel
The next stage of the Bereaved Families' Forum campaign will run under the slogan, "Better the path of peace, than the path of war." Frankenthal thinks that the campaign for peace is crucial at this time. "Do you have a better solution?" he asks. "Even if Israel stages incursions into the PA territories a hundred times, we still can't prevent eventually granting independence to the other side."

"Our goal is to give legitimization to the peace process and its supporters," adds Cohen. "The campaign is optimistic. We wish to go forward, and not backwards. Even the symbol we chose for our group is appropriate - a light at the end of the tunnel."

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