‘There’s nothing more important than dealing with violent bigotry’

In the first of a series of conversations, Vic Alhadeff meets Adam Geha, a Lebanese Christian who is working to promote greater participation in March of the Living by the wider community.

I was born in Beirut in 1971, a child of the civil war. It was a reign of terror which impacted me profoundly. I lived within an external hell but an internal heaven. We grew up as a Christian family in a Muslim area of Beirut. It was a loving family that valued education and was a haven of tranquillity in a world that was violent and unpredictable. One night a bomb exploded in the apartment next door.

My father was a mechanical engineer who specialised in air-conditioning. He relocated to Saudi Arabia for three years and we eventually joined him there. While seeking refuge in Damascus, terrorists broke into our hotel. My mother was hit by two bullets and my father and two brothers were taken hostage. I was hiding in a closet in a connected room with an aunt. Fortunately, we all survived.

In Riyadh I attended a Muslim school, memorised the Koran and prayed five times a day, as Muslims do. As a result, I developed an interest in multi-faith work and from an early age wondered why faiths dedicated to love and charity often end up fighting. Yet I’m not a pacifist; Hitler needed to be opposed. But force must be a last resort because of the horrors it inflicts on the innocent.

I see the meaning of life as personal and transcendental. Personal because it resides in relationships. That’s where I find my motivation, through my wife Julie – a devout Catholic of Croatian background – and our children, Immanuel, 14, and Eva, 10.

But life is also transcendental; the only race the human race should be focused on is the one between our wisdom and power. Sadly, our power eclipses our wisdom as a species.

My mother is Australian of Lebanese descent and was smart enough to ensure we had dual nationality at birth. We moved here when I was nine. After finishing my education, I moved into the finance industry, with a focus on investment banking and venture capital.