One of the things that has become increasingly clear over the last two weeks is the generational divide in the U.S. over Israel and Palestine. Younger Americans, who came of age after the invasion of Iraq, without any real memory of 9/11, and who are far more attuned to the vocabulary of social justice—and social media—have always seen this conflict stuck in this current state, a vicious retaliatory loop. 

I came of age, on the other hand, in the 1990s, when the two-state solution seemed not like a pipe dream, but something that was on the very verge of happening. There were constant peace negotiations, constant signings of understandings and frameworks; there was a peace process. And America, which is now either vilified as Israel’s chief enabler, sending billions in bombs and guns, or lauded as Israel’s staunchest ally, was, back then, the chief convener of this peace process. With the Cold War over and its political capital sky-high, it was the only country that seemed able to get the two sides to sit down, negotiate, and have a signing ceremony.

Even where I was, in Jewish day schools with a strong Zionist core, there was a constant sense of hope and optimism that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, as it was then called, would be resolved not just within our lifetimes, but within the next couple of years. Yitzhak Rabin was our hero and the whole school mourned when he was assassinated by a right-wing Israeli who had hoped to derail the peace process. We feared, deeply, that his plan might succeed.