Editorial

The IAFP Committee organising the 2023 annual IAFP conference in Turin could not possibly have imagined how their title, “From pain to violence”, anticipated the eruption of such a violent conflict on 7 October 2023. The day before, two four-year-old boys, Omer Siman-Tov in Israel and Omar Bilal-al-Banna in Palestine, living twenty-three kilometres apart, played happily outside. On 7 October 2023, Omer was killed by Hamas at his home in Israel. On 11 October, Omar was killed by an Israeli airstrike on his home city of Gaza. Omer and Omar never met, but if they had, they would have wanted to play together because that's what little children do. As if the killing and loss of their two small children was not horrendous enough, both sets of families and friends have had to subsequently contend with repulsive social media exchanges, mainly via X. These have denied Omar's death (he was only a doll masqueraded around) or blamed the “other” (Omer was killed by his own Israeli people and not by Hamas) (BBC News, 26 October 2023).

Omer and Omar were real little children. The dreadful suffering afflicting so many children, parents, families, and friends in the Middle East presently, and elsewhere in many other parts of the world, continues, regardless of colour, creed, or “side”. The current political climate has become contaminated by algo-rhythmically boosted, revenue-driven “news” delivered by social media platforms. It feels as though the important boundary between a societal id and ego has vapourised, enabling the most base and barbaric aspects in humans to emerge. To make matters worse, this unleashing of hatred and violence is highly contagious. If an outbreak of peace is ever to be achieved in such intractable conflict zones, all “sides” must come together respectfully, listen to each other, and then hear each other. All “sides” need to hear the pain of the hated other that led to the violence. Understanding the aetiology is the first necessary step for reconciliation a