The starting point for the conflict was material, the land both groups wanted as living place. But in addition to living place, for both groups the same land had special meaning. For Jews, it was the land they prayed to return to for two thousand years, and also the land on which they believed they could avoid the persecution they have suffered for many centuries, culminating in the Holocaust, the murder of about 6 million Jews in Nazi Europe. For Palestinians it was the land on which they have lived for a long time, on which they suffered repressive rule by various countries – Turkey, England, then Israel– the land that has been their home. The same land is not only needed as living place but is central to the identity of both groups.

In addition, material conflict, when it is not resolved, when it turns violent and resists resolution, when it becomes “intractable,” also becomes increasingly psychological. In the course of violence people justify their own actions. They come to devalue the other more and more, feel that they are right, their cause is just, and the other is wrong, responsible for the continuation of the conflict and immoral. It is these powerful psychological elements that make many conflicts especially difficult to resolve. The deeply set human tendency for reciprocity, universal across cultures, also means that groups respond to the others’ violence, often with greater violence. Cycles of retaliation maintain and intensify the violence. While Palestinian terrorism has created loss of lives, great fear and uncertainty in Israel in the past, given Israel’s military power and tendency to strike back, the material harm done to Palestinians, in lives and destruction of property, has been even greater.

The psychological woundedness that results from past victimization contributes to violence. When groups of people are the targets of violence, as both Jews and Palestinians have been, they come to see the world as dangerous. It is difficult for them to trust others groups, especially an opponent in a violent conflict that has harmed them. Mistrust makes negotiation more challenging, and a response to the other with what people believe is necessary “defensive” violence more likely. Healing from such wounds can contribute to the possibility of peaceful relations. Acknowledgment of suffering by others, engagement with painful experiences in constructive ways, commemoration that not only focuses on the pain and suffering but also on the possibility of a positive future all can contribute to healing. Mutual acknowledgement by Israelis and Palestinians of the other’s suffering, and on ways they have contributed to it, would be especially helpful. So would a societal process be of examining how the group’s woundedness affects its perception of events and responses to it. The resulting awareness might begin to shift perceptions and reactions.

Another important source of continuing violence is a destructive ideology, a vision of social arrangements, of relations between groups (and often also between individual), which also identifies some group as standing in the way of its fulfillment. Both groups hold such ideology. A minority of Israelis, who have substantial influence, hold on to the vision of Greater Israel, the recreation of the historical Israel, which includes the West Bank, where Palestinians live. Many (although far from all) of the people who live in the settlements in the West Bank are there to hold the land for Greater Israel, with a number of small but influential political parties committed to this. It is hard to know where Prime Minister Netanyahu stands on this, coming from a family strongly committed to a Greater Israel.

On the other side Hamas, and probably an unknown percentage of the Palestinian population, holds a vision of the region without Israel. With the aim of the destruction of Israel as a state, and with profound devaluation of Jews in their documents, it is unclear what Hamas’ vision is of what should happen to Jews who live in Israel. It is not surprising if Israelis believe that Hamas threatens not only their state, but also their lives. On the other hand, Israel has not engaged in actions that might have moderated Hamas’ ideology, or tested Hamas’ readiness to move toward peace. Instead of waiting to see how Hamas would act when it was elected in 2006 by Palestinians to form the government in the Palestinian territories, and even attempting to positively engage with the new government, Israel immediately took actions to contain it. Given Jewish woundedness, the unwillingness to take the risk of engaging with a foe whose words and actions trumpet that it aims to destroy you may be understandable. But Israel as the more powerful party in relation to Hamas, and at the same time surrounded by Arab countries, must take such risks both in its own and in the Palestinians’ interest.

A constructive ideology could be a helpful guide to and motivator of peaceful relations, and an essential motivator for resolving the conflict. One useful vision or ideology would be of an economic community including Israel and a Palestinian state to be created. This vision could include an elaboration of how constructive economic development could contribute to peace in the region, and how that would contribute to peace between Islam and Western countries.

Violence toward another group is perhaps always justified by increasing devaluation of that group. This can lead to new and greater violence. Humanizing the other through words, and deep engagement between people belonging to the different groups can both help resolve the conflict, and promote reconciliation and lasting peace. We now know that when peace agreements are not accompanied by reconciliation, there is frequently renewed violence between groups.

There have been many contacts between Israelis and Palestinians, which perhaps helped limit the extent of violence. But often these contacts are of short duration and limited in their function. Even dialogue and negotiation between leaders has usually been for very limited duration at a time. Contact is most likely to overcome devaluation and lead to more positive views of the other if there is persistent engagement, serving shared goals. It is more likely to have good long term effects if there are structures which naturally provide contact, such as shared work settings, shared schools with cooperative learning practices in which children work on shared tasks, joint committees that work for shared purposes.

For lasting peace another important matter to address is collective memories, the narratives of each group about the conflict. These narratives blame the other, and do not acknowledge the responsibility of one’s own group. They can lead to the renewal of conflict. For a long time the Israeli narrative was that the 700 thousand Palestinians who became refugees after Israel declared independence, which was followed by Arab armies attacking Israel, left because their leaders told them to leave for the duration of the war, which they believed was going to be short and victorious. The Palestinian narrative has been that they were all expelled. The “new historians” in Israel established that some Palestinian were directly expelled, some were encouraged to leave by leaflets and in other ways, many left to escape the fighting near their villages, and others because they were told by leaders to leave. This account has been supported by studies of Palestinians who left. Moving toward a shared and more balanced history can make a lasting peace more possible.

Helping people understand the influences that make conflict intractable and lead to violence, the psychological impact of violence on people, and ways to prevent violence and move toward reconciliation can have a variety of positive effects that make the resolution of conflict and lasting peace possible. My associates and I have conducted workshops and trainings in Rwanda to promote such understanding, with the staff of local organizations, members of the media, national leaders, and others. We then progressed to educational radio programs, including radio dramas in Rwanda, and then Burundi and the Congo, serving the same purposes. Separate evaluation studies of the training (primarily their effects “once removed,” on members of community groups that were led by facilitators we have trained, in comparison to control groups) and of the effects of the radio drama after the first year (now in its 8^th year), showed a variety of positive effect. They included reduced trauma symptoms, more positive orientation by members of the groups (Hutus and Tutsis) toward each other, more “conditional forgiveness,” greater willingness by people to say what they believed and more independence of authority, greater empathy with various parties. (These projects and the evaluation studies are also described in Overcoming Evil. Some articles about them, especially the trainings, can be found at www.ervinstaub.com under downloads).

Resolving conflict, preventing violence, and promoting reconciliation require the joining of a variety of approaches/practices. They also require committed active bystanders, people within the groups and individuals, groups, and nations in the outside world who are willing to take the often courageous actions required to exert positive influence. External bystanders are often passive, or even complicit, supporting destructive ideologies, policies, and violence. Leaders in the U.S. who take positive action often lack the political courage to be persistent and follow through. External actors working with internal ones and exerting influence on leaders and followers on both sides are essential if groups or countries are to shift direction and move from intractable conflict toward peace.

This is a slightly revised version of an article that will be published in Fall/Winter 2011 issue of Peace Psychology, 20(2).

This article is based on material in Staub, E. (2011). Overcoming Evil: Genocide, Violent Conflict and Terrorism. New York: Oxford University Press. The book gives an overview of the influences that lead to group violence, and describes principles and practices of prevention and reconciliation. One of the primary cases to which this material is applied in the book is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.