By Dani Hemmat, Special to JTNews
One thing has followed Assaf Nisenboym his entire life: The sound of sirens. These sirens come not from fire engines or police cars, but from air raids. According to Nisenboym, when you hear those sirens, “you know that missiles are heading your way.”
Nisenboym, 26, spoke to a large crowd at Congregation Kol Shalom on Bainbridge Island on Jan. 23, where he spent the afternoon sharing his perspective on growing up in Israel. Nisenboym is an Israeli fellow from StandWithUs Northwest, where as a volunteer he is traveling around the Northwest for six months to present a picture of Israel and its people not always represented in the international media.
“My intention isn’t political at all,” said Nisenboym, “It’s only to give people a taste of Israel as I know it. This is how I grew up.”
Nisenboym graduated in September 2010 from Ben Gurion University of the Negev with a degree in economics. Upon fulfilling his military service, doing the requisite traveling, feeling ready to embark on his “real life,” he decided first to commit some time to helping the Northwest’s residents — mostly youth — to an insider’s view of daily living and the struggles that Israelis face as a fact of life.
Armed with little more than a slide show and a smile, Nisenboym said when he speaks at high schools, he always starts off with a perspective shot of Israel.
“I ask them, ‘How big is Israel? Is it as big as Washington State?’ and they all say, ‘No, it’s much bigger!’” he told the audience. “When I show them Israel and how it fits into the tiny space in Washington, they can’t believe it.”
Nisenboym said most teenagers don’t know anything about Israel. He paints them a portrait of the Israeli population, showing images of a broad ethnic mix.
“When I ask kids what they think Israelis look like, it gets uncomfortable; it’s not such a politically correct question here in the Northwest,” he said. “No one usually wants to answer, so I show them [images of several different ethnicities] and say that it is a great mixture of people from all over the world, from many different cultures.”
A passionate surfer who loves the water, Nisenboym recounted how, as a 10-year-old boy, the sirens would blare where they lived near Beer Sheva, and he and his siblings would be shut into their safe room, a small room in their house with plastic sheeting taped over the openings to prevent poisonous gases from getting inside. He would huddle with his sister and worry about his father, who was serving in the reserves.
“All you can do, when you hear the missiles and the sirens, is pray they hit somewhere else,” he said.
During his mandated military service, he found himself in another missile raid, this time near Haifa. As he shut himself in a bomb shelter with other soldiers and civilians, he noticed a familiar face. It was his sister, also serving in the military.
“Here I was, older, more mature, but with the sirens, the missiles, and my sister with me in this bomb shelter, it was like 15 years earlier in the safe room,” Nisenboym said. “Being older didn’t make it any easier. I kept thinking of my mother, and how two of her three children were there, on the front lines fighting for their country, with missiles falling all around them. It never gets easier.”
Though some might think it natural for a person with Nisenboym’s experiences to harbor ill will for the Palestinian people, he said he doesn’t feel that way.
“I am from Israel, and I am pro-Israeli and pro-Palestinian. I want both sides to have peace and a good life.”
Robert Jacobs, regional director of StandWithUs Northwest, told the audience that the easy, casual way that Nisenboym presents the portrait of his life in Israel furthers the organization’s mission. It was created primarily as a response to pro-Palestinian speakers presenting murky viewpoints of Israel to high school assemblies. StandWithUs seeks to catch young people before they form opinions about Israel that might be fueled by the emotional language that often accompanies discussions on college campuses.
“Legitimate criticism of Israel is valid…it’s when it becomes an over-the-top effort to get people to dislike Israel, rather than get people to talk about the real problems…that’s why we do this,” Jacobs said. “Presentations like Assaf’s are almost an inoculation, in a sense, to open up a real conversation, one that’s not filled with emotionally laden language about Israel. Our hope is that people educate themselves and are open to listening.”
Nisenboym said his work with StandWithUs reflects his hopes and dreams.
“I do pray for the Palestinians to have their own state, their own country, to live side by side with us. I want them to be safe with their families, and I want Israelis to be safe with theirs. That is my hope. And my dream…my dream is to surf with a Palestinian kid from the Gaza Strip. That’s what I want.”