Even today, our perception of the Middle East remains to some extent a product of a necessarily Western-centric perspective. What are these value systems? And how fair is it to speak of, to consider the region as something unified, to have formed – at least a large portion of public opinion in the West – a monolithic perception of a region where different communities coexist and at the same time clash to the death?

Can these peoples coexist? The Arabs believe they preceded the Jews in the region, while the Jews claim the opposite and that the creation of the state of Israel in 1948 was a historically just act. Both believe they are the chosen people, and this belief transcends the borders of the Middle East.

While a usual war concerns imposing the will of one side over the other, here we have an attempt to impose a different reality, which leaves no room for the existence of the opposing side. This is a war of extermination. It is one thing to fight to achieve political objectives and another to fight for the total destruction of the opponent. It is like the Third Punic War, where defeat meant annihilation. The two peoples live in completely different realities, which, however, are deeply influenced by the historical experience that has shaped their beliefs.

What happens in the Middle East does not stay in the Middle East. Palestine is a region where reality feeds an extremely violent mythology, and this mythology in turn feeds reality with even greater levels of violence. The discussions of the four were interactive, lively, and inherently very dynamic, as each time they were called upon to assess developments that were dense and overwhelming.