Arab Festival, Seattle Center & Jewish Community Festival, Bellevue Downtown Park.

Every other year since 1999, the Arab Center of Washington has offered an insider’s view to the unique cultures of the Arab world. Music, dance, food, coffee, children’s activities, fashion show, Arabic spelling bee, and a bazaar add festivity and present the human dimension of Arab-American life. Cultural booths represent Iraq, Egypt, Syria, Libya, Palestine, Morocco, and others. See the Arab Center website for more information on the activities and performers. The Olive Branch booth will join other vendors representing Arabic products, services and culture outside on the Fisher Pavilion. This will be a first for Olive Branch Enterprises and to some degree for the Arab Festival as well. See the Seattle Center website and type in “Arab Festival” in the search field for a detailed schedule. Also check out the Center’s directions page.

This year’s Jewish Community Festival will be in downtown Bellevue. See the Jewish Federation website for directions to the Bellevue Downtown Park and to stay tuned for the coming schedules of activities, performers and an Israel Walk.

Peace Oil belongs to all humanity and the Seattle Jewish community has been very supportive, actively reaching out to help this venture that brings economic benefit to Israel’s closest neighbors, the people of Palestine. Olive Branch Enterprises believes that despite the years of conflict, Israelis and Palestinians are capable of repairing the damage and moving forward to a sustainable solution that provides sustenance, justice and equality for all.

Looking Back (written 11/12/07)

Both festivals were a success sales-wise and people-wise. At the Arab Festival, one liter bottles of Canaan Fair Trade, 2005 vintage were sold along with Peace Oil. The sweet, fruity aroma of the Nabali olive oil was hugely popular. Traffic flow was moderate but the people were there to interact, learn and teach. This was not a crowd of passive consumers but individuals connecting to their community and culture.

A young Palestinian told me how eating olive oil from his homeland was a bitter-sweet experience, reminding him and his family of things lost. He told me this without a hint of bitterness. An Arab-Israeli expressed his hopes for peace and recognized the complexity and difficult nature of the issues. One man joked he could not buy Peace Oil with the Israeli flag on it. He was partly serious, but mostly jesting good naturedly.

The Peace Oil booth was in the same area as the extensive music and dance performance line-up. One highlight was a Palestinian dance troop. Many of the dances were ones we had learned as young Jews at a Habonim Labor Zionist summer camp back east. In one piece they sang about the return to their homeland. As a Jew it made me a bit nervous, but I couldn’t help but recognize the parallel to the songs we sang and sometimes still do. The audience was filled with excitement and followed the song with a loud, rousing response of cheers and clapping. I could see tears in my wife’s eyes.

The Jewish Festival started off on a Noah-like note. Rain was pouring down despite the fact that August is usually the one month in Seattle we can depend on for dry weather. But not today. We were once again battling the rain (see University Street Fair - May News Archive) as it tried to soak all our bread samples and ruin our and everyone else’s day. But slowly the rain backed down a bit and the crowd began to show up. At this festival I sold Salam Shalom EVOO along with Peace Oil.

Again and again people opened their hearts to express their hope for peace and their support for joint projects of this nature. They also “put their money where their mouths were” and bought a good amount. It was hard to keep up and by the end of the day we were exhausted.

The full spectrum of the Jewish Community was present from very orthodox to reform, conservative to liberal, young, old, black, white, straight, gay, American, Israeli; you name it, they were there. I only had one person express reservations about Peace Oil. He was a young assistant rabbi from a Seattle congregation. We discussed the lack of a hechsher (symbol on the label indicating that a rabbi has verified the product is kosher). I explained that I am working on this issue but it is a bit complicated by the fact that I have three sources of olive oil, one of which doesn’t plan on having a rabbi inspect their operations any time soon.

He also said he couldn't buy Peace Oil as the Palestinian flag made him uncomfortable. I explained that Peace Oil had just recently been at the Arab Festival, that it was a way to build a bridge between the two people. He asked if anyone at the Arab Festival had complained about the Israeli flag. No, not really (I couldn’t truthfully count the one humorous mention of the flag as a complaint). I could immediately see a change in him as he processed this idea. This moment of opening to new possibility made me feel the sun come out. I could see the dove coming to my ark in the middle of this rain-soaked field.

August 2007 News Archive