Why Australian Jews should hear Gil and Hiba together 

When Dr Gil Murciano heard that Kibbutz Be'eri was under attack on 7 October, 2023, his mind went straight to a close friend who lived there. For weeks he avoided checking Facebook, afraid to see the inevitable. Eventually he learned his friend had been killed defending the kibbutz. Murciano says he feels "fortunate" not to have lost family as well as friends that day. But the word catches in his throat: the trauma of that morning shapes every sentence he utters about Israel's future. 

For Hiba Qasas, the violence is just as intimate. She grew up in Nablus during the First Intifada, walking to school between rocks and bullets. In the Second Intifada, her family home was shelled. As a young woman she lost her boyfriend, shot by the IDF. She speaks of these events calmly, but they sit in the background of everything she says about justice, security and dignity. 

Both have buried loved ones. Both carry deep scars. And yet, ahead of their joint visit to Australia in June as guests of New Israel Fund (NIF) Australia, they have chosen to work together: an Israeli security analyst and a Palestinian peacebuilder, insisting that the only sustainable future is one they build side by side. 

Since October 7 and the devastation in Gaza, calls for revenge have echoed across both societies. Murciano and Qasas understand that impulse better than most, and both consciously refuse to be guided by it. 

Murciano, a former IDF officer who became a national security and diplomacy expert, acknowledges that a powerful "quest for revenge" swept Israel after the massacre. He understands the temptation, especially for bereaved families, to conclude that October 7 revealed "the real face" of Palestinians and that peace is naive. Yet his professional life has been shaped by a different conviction.