Dangerous stories: Encountering narratives of the other in the israeli-palestinian conflict

Abstract

This study explores the effects of continuous long-term exposure to the contesting narrative of the outgroup in the context of the protracted conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. Specifically, it examines the extent to which Jewish Israeli facilitators of dialogue with members of the Palestinian outgroup experience their repeated exposure to Palestinians and to Palestinian narratives as impacting their views, feelings, and actions, as well as their attitudes toward the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Thematic content analysis of 20 in-depth interviews with Jewish facilitators of reconciliation-aimed dialogue groups reveals that the repeated exposure of Jewish Israelis to the Palestinian narrative is associated with increased awareness of and moral concern for the suffering and distress of Palestinians. The findings contribute to our understanding of how intergroup dialogues that expose participants to the narratives of the outgroup can help them cope with and even mitigate the destructive role that ethnocentric ingroup narratives may play in conditions of conflict. © 2013 American Psychological Association.