Maoz Inon lost both parents in the October 7 attacks. Aziz Abu Sarah, whose brother died after torture in an Israeli prison, reached out in the days that followed. Their shared grief became the foundation of a close friendship and a partnership in peace activism.

In this conversation with GZERO Media’s Tony Maciulis, the coauthors of The Future Is Peace describe what that relationship asks of them. They discuss listening to painful accounts of the past and challenging the stories they grew up with, while making room for anger. A stop in Jaffa brings their different understandings of 1948 into focus. They also address criticism of their work and the question of how to engage people who deny the other side’s right to exist.

On the third anniversary of the attacks, Inon and Abu Sarah discuss the daily work of sustaining that relationship—and what it would take to turn their commitment to peace into political action.