It’s Time for Peace

Amid fragile ceasefires between Israel, Iran, and Hezbollah earlier this spring, the main hall of a major conference center in Tel Aviv quickly filled to capacity late on a Thursday afternoon as some 5,000 Israelis, Palestinians, and international guests gathered for the central event of the annual People’s Peace Summit – to affirm their shared belief in a safe, peaceful, and just future for everyone living between the river and the sea.

The crowd cheered as the words “It Must Be. It Can Be. It Will Be. Peace” – the theme of this year’s summit – were projected from the stage in English, Hebrew, and Arabic, lighting up the sold-out auditorium.
The People’s Peace Summit is organized by It’s Time – a coalition of 80 nonprofit organizations that was formed in the wake of the October 7 attacks to promote peace and shared society in Israel and Palestine. The Robert Weil Family Foundation is a proud supporter of the conference, alongside partners such as the European Union.

This year’s summit was attended by Knesset members from progressive parties, including representatives of Israel’s Democratic Party and the Arab Joint List. Among international guests were the ambassadors of Sweden and Canada to Israel, as well as the Swedish and French consuls general in Jerusalem.

When the word peace disappears from public discourse – or worse, is treated with suspicion – it must be repeated again and again, one of the conference’s speakers stressed from the stage. Peace is not a fantasy but a real and necessary possibility – one that can be achieved if Israelis and Palestinians listen to each other and work together, another speaker argued.

Losses on both sides of the conflict were honored during the summit, which featured sessions across five conference halls throughout the day. In one conference room, the installation “A Child is a Child” displayed the names of every child killed since October 7 – in Gaza, the West Bank, and Israel.

From the summit’s main stage, 31-year-old Mai Peri paid tribute to his grandfather, Chaim Peri, an Israeli peace activist who was kidnapped by Hamas on October 7 and later murdered in captivity.

In an address from the West Bank, Bushra Awad spoke of her son Mahmoud, who was killed at 18 in 2008 as a result of the conflict. Since then, Bushra said, she has turned her pain into a space for dialogue and action for peace. Pain doesn’t have to be the end of the road. It can be the beginning of a greater understanding and humanity. That is my message to the world, she told the audience.