Members of Kibbutz El Rom in the Golan Heights recently arranged stones in the shape of a giant peace symbol on a mountain side facing Syria. Captured by Israel from Syria in a 1967 war, the Golan Heights region has been quiet for decades. However, Syrian gunfire and shelling have occasionally spilled into the territory over the past few months, with Israel routinely shooting back. About 40 youths from Kibbutz El Rom spent their weekend arranging basalt stones to create the giant peace sign facing Syria. Kibbutz residents Tal Sade and Sivan Bas said on Monday they wanted the peace that has prevailed over the last decades to remain. Sade said it was all the more remarkable that most of the people who participated in the creation of the peace sign served in Israeli army combat units. "Most of the people who did it had served in combat units in the army and I think to serve in combat units in the army and to lose some of your best friends and to hate the world actually and to come afterwards, when you are 26, 27 years old, when you are more mature, and to make that sign, if that is not a statement of ... of I don't know what ... quiet, peace, coexistence, someone to have a conversation with, I don't know what is," Sade said, standing by a wall adorned with barbed wire and a watchtower. Bas said she hoped the message could be reproduced in other places experiencing conflict. "We hope to send a sign, send a sign to the whole world, we hope people will do the same may be in other borders, may be in other places in the world," Bas said. "If the youth will see what we are trying to do here, if a Syrian kid will see that, may be in the future both of them could talk, at least talk, not make peace, talk ... talk first," Sade added. Since Israel annexed the Golan Heights from Syria in 1967, the countries have technically remained at war, though Syrian troops are not allowed in an area of separation under a 1973 cease-fire formalized in 1974. The United Nations Disengagement Observer Force monitors the area of separation, a narrow strip of land running 45 miles (70 kilometers) from Mount Hermon on the Lebanese border to the Yarmouk River frontier with Jordan. Syria's conflict started more than two years ago with mainly peaceful demonstrations against President Bashar Assad, but has since descended into civil war.
Kibbutz sends a message of peace in a region at war
About 40 young people from Kibbutz El Rom spent their weekend arranging basalt stones to create a giant peace sign • "We hope to send a sign, send a sign to the whole world," says resident.
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