Yeah! That was the idea. So it was really political—about Jerusalem elections and stuff happening in Israel. And we had this campaign, me and a friend of mine, called “Shimon and Shimon.” So we were taking pictures of ourselves like two politicians, Shimon and Shimon running for office. It was really popular at that time on the streets. But with the internet and social media, suddenly you can access way more people. You can, with one post, get to millions. So I always made stuff for the internet and used my graphic abilities to say something about politics. With that specific poster [points to screen], I was really afraid that we were going to war with Iran.

What year was this?

It was 2012, just after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went to the US Congress and gave the nuclear duck talk. You know that one.

No.

So there’s the saying, “If it quacks like a duck and walks like a duck, it’s probably a duck.” And Benjamin made the same analogy with Iran’s atomic bomb. He’s a good talker. I was watching on TV how people in the Congress responded, clapping, he was convincing those guys that war was coming. At some point, you’ve got to shoot. I was like, “Okay, this is the day that war with Iran might be decided.”

On your behalf.

Yeah! We’re sitting here in Israel, and he’s convincing the Congress in the States that it’s okay to have some preventative strike on Iran. I was like, “Now they’re going to do it. They’re just going to attack Iran.” So I said, “What can I do about it?” I was sitting in my living room afraid, and then I thought, Oh my God, what the people of Iran must feel now! I mean the same father, with a wife and two kids sitting in Tehran—what he must feel. My reaction was to tell them, like in the Sting song: “If the Russians love their children too,”

Yeah. In a few minutes, I make the poster and post it. It’s an image of me and my daughter Ella holding the Israeli flag and written under it is: “Iranians we love you. We will never bomb your country.” I also wrote a long letter to the Iranian people. To me, the letter was more important than the image. “To all the fathers, the mothers, the children, the brothers and the sisters. For there to be a war between us, first we must be afraid of each other. We must hate. I am not afraid of you, I don’t even know you. No Iranian ever did me any harm. I never even met an Iranian. Just one, in Paris, in a museum—nice dude.”

“Sometimes I see an Iranian on TV talking about war. I am sure it does not represent all of the people of Iran. If you see someone on your TV talking about bombing you, be sure it does not represent all of us. I am not an official representative of my country, I am a father and a teacher. I know the streets of my towns. I talk with my neighbours, my family, my students, my friends. And in the name of all these people: we love you, we mean you no harm. On the contrary, we want to meet you, have some coffee and talk about sports. To all those who feel the same, share this message and help it reach the Iranian people.”

So you pressed enter, and then you got on with your day. You made the kids dinner, gave them a bath.

Yeah! CNN, Al Jazeera, BBC. All the time. We weren’t prepared, you know? So it got bigger and bigger. And at some point we had so many friends on our personal page, Pushpin, that we had to open a page dedicated to the organisation. Because you can only have 5000 friends on a personal page. My friend set up the organisation page for us, and I said, “What are we going to call this?” And he said, “I don’t know! What’s the first thing that comes to mind?” “Israel Loves Iran.” He said, “Yeah, that sounds lame. Let’s go with that.”

[Laughs].

And that’s how it happened. We opened a page called “Israel loves Iran”, I made a logo, and then it went big.

What does “big” mean?

Yes, though when you’re talking about love and saying, “Let’s be friends,” politicians don’t know how to deal with that. So it doesn’t get through on that level. That’s why we still have propaganda happening. All this brainwashing. What we’re doing is re-humanising at the simplest level. It’s opening the door to conversation, to communication, to friendship and ultimately to peace. When I realised there was something in this, I just kept pushing it with heart and simplicity. I didn’t want to do anything too sophisticated and fancy. It’s like basic, basic. Helvetica, a few big words. A big heart. Don’t overthink it. And it works!

Maybe 10, 11. And this is my friend, Malik, he is a Muslim. And this is Mohammed and this is David. Nobody at that time was talking about anti-Semitism and stuff like that. We were just having fun and it was okay. I come from a place where it was really okay to have a lot of Arab friends. We were all raised to be together. It was the ’80s in France. Back then it was nice. Coming to Israel was a big change because in Israel I realised that Jews and Muslims were not talking.

When did you move to Israel?

In ’89. It was just after my study and I wanted to try something else. I wanted a change so I decided Israel. It could have been Canada, anywhere.

And you went into the army.

Yeah I was in the paratroopers. I didn’t do it because I wanted to be a fighter, it was more of a social accomplishment. Here in Israel the army is still something that is very strong. It’s how you define yourself as an Israeli. And I really wanted to be an Israeli. So I went for the most difficult path! And I ended up in really, really crazy situations. I was in the West Bank, I was in Lebanon. And I was looking at Intifada first hand. I was part of what’s happening. It wasn’t the news suddenly, it was my life. And it was really challenging for me because I remember having this thought, How can we change things? How can I be nice to these people? But also I was wearing a uniform and a gun and I was in their village. So they were looking at me like I was the enemy. And I was just seeing them as people on the street. People I might talk to.

Yeah. That stayed with me for all my service in the army. I mean every time we were in the West Bank and places like that, I was really struggling. Trying to do the right thing in the worst situation possible. It’s really, really complicated. When you’re at a checkpoint and you know why you’re there, because you have the mission to not let potential terrorists into Jerusalem, it’s complicated. Because you have to check everybody. So there’s a long line of people, it’s the middle of the day, it’s hot, people are like dehydrating in front of your face. And you have to check everybody. And you want to be nice. But the line is starting to push and people are getting upset and there is this mother with a kid and she wants to be first in the line, and you understand why, because she has a kid. So you want to take her to the front of the queue. But people start saying, “Hey, I’ve been here from five in the morning! And my mother is waiting for me at the hospital!”

You know? And you’re only 18. You’re only 18 and your officer is 19. So it’s a bunch of kids in the craziest situation making the worst mistakes of their life because there is no adult. You know? And I was a good guy. Imagine the…

Assholes!

I had many assholes in my platoon! I was arguing with them all the time! “Why did you do that?” “How can you talk like that to this woman? She could be your mother!” “How…?” It was really, really challenging. I think the whole issue that we have to be there is crazy. And that the army has to do it! It’s not a job for the army. It’s a job for maybe police. It’s also crazy because sometimes you’re in the line and someone takes a knife and you have to shoot first. You have to be aware all the time, you have to be, like, stressed, but you want to be nice. It’s really, really complicated. It’s not easy as media shows you. It’s a fucked up situation because those guys want to get into Israel. They need to get to hospitals or their jobs or to the airports. They’re crossing a border. People need to cross from the West Bank to Gaza. You have to allow them to do that. The other thing is when you’re 18 and you do that job, you’re not sleeping well, you’re eating shit. You’re away from home for long weeks.

There are no grown-ups giving you wisdom, counsel at the end of the day.

You’re 18 and he’s 10. And all your friends are like, “Let’s take him out! Take him to the station.” And me, I want to say, “Fuck it, let’s leave him.” But the sergeants say, “No, we’re taking him to the station.” And start an argument. And then the father comes. And the brothers. And then the whole village is out of the house. And then some people start to throw stones at the house. That’s how it is! It’s every day.

So how in the world do you go from that experience to the Peace Factory?

Exactly because of that experience! Exactly because of that experience. Because those situations are there. Because we keep on sending our children, at all of 18, to do that again and again because we’re not getting to the point of making peace with the Palestinians. Israel keeps on not telling the world where the frontier of Israel is. That’s a big problem. Decide already what is your border! And Israel is not deciding because politically, for Bibi Netanyahu, it’s suicide. He can’t do it.

So I put a post the other day on Twitter that I was going to be interviewing you and the first retweet I got was from a guy whose Twitter handle said, “How to wipe Zionism off the map.” I got it at midnight. And I was unable to sleep, completely terrified that some scary, hate- filled person just retweeted my tweet to all their hate-filled followers and I’ve just gone on some sort of black list. It was scary. So how do you…

First of all, take it easy.

[Laughs].

It’s social media. People will retweet and it’s not personal. There’s no black list.

Yeah but you put a picture of yourself with your daughter and the Israeli flag and “Israel Loves Iran.”

We also have a lot of negative comments and a lot of people from Israel and abroad say, “We’re going to kill you!”

You’ve had death threats?

All the time. I have a group of people who do admin for the page. And their job was just to erase all the bad stuff they were putting on the page. It was so much.

What was it in comparison to the good stuff?

He understands what it is to be a Zionist. What it is to be an Israeli. Because people living in Australia generally have no clue. It’s like, “What do I know about what’s happening in Mexico? Only what I see on TV.” And what I see on TV and what you guys see on TV about Israel is just the bad stuff. It’s also all black and white. There is no…

Grey.

Because they ’re like, “We have to protect, we have to be ready!” What are you protecting? I don’t need your protection. Don’t be ready for me. You want to be ready? Come to live in Israel first. You want to do something about Israel? Come to live. But don’t tell me to be ready. Don’t tell me how to interact with the Palestinians. Don’t tell me from the States what I have to do here. Why? You’ve never been here! I mean, most of you don’t understand what’s happening here. It’s not something that’s happening in a dream. It’s happening every day. And the problems in Israel are economic, like everywhere in the world. We have economic issues. So do the Palestinians.