One Year After October 7th, Milton Hosts A Second Israel-Palestine Panel

By Adrienne Fung ‘25 & Jason Yu ‘25

At 7:00PM on Wednesday, October 9th, the entirety of Milton’s boarding community filed into the ACC, crowding around a dessert table before taking their seats in front of the projector screen. A similar scene took place with the day's student population the next afternoon (albeit without dessert).  

In each hour-long event moderated by members of the Public Issues Board, Mr. Emmott, Dr. Gokce, and Dr. Nurenberg—of the History and English departments, respectively— assembled to offer a primer on the Israel-Palestine conflict. 

Last week’s panels were the second of their kind hosted at Milton; the first took place in Straus Library one year prior, soon after the October 6 attacks. “We’ve had a year to reflect on the events, and a lot has happened in that year,” Nurenberg explained. “So the situation we’re talking about now, I think, has added dimensions that were not present last year.”

This year’s panel was split into two sessions: one for boarding students before study hall and another for day students during the day. Unlike times past, last week’s event was mandatory. 

The panel offered a succinct yet multifaceted overview of the context surrounding the conflict, clarifying the histories of Israel and Palestine as well as the tensions and perspectives of each side. To conclude the event, they ceded the floor to student questions. 

Emmott’s main intention was to bridge understanding between various communities on campus: “[Discussing] this conflict is important because of the impact it has on [our] community, where many people are affected by this conflict. At Milton, Jewish and Arabic/Muslim families [have often] felt misunderstood by the larger community.”

“You might go through your classes here without ever learning about this topic,” said Gokce, “so we felt it important to give students some context.” 

Nurenberg emphasized the multifaceted nature of the crisis. “I think it’s important for students to understand that conflicts like these are complicated. One of the marks of an educated person is the ability to see nuance and to appreciate multiple narratives,” he said, “ and that was certainly one of my goals [for the panel].”

In addition to providing general information, the event was also held in anticipation of next week’s scheduled programming: on Tuesday, Oct 22, Ambassador Dennis Ross, the former special Middle East coordinator under President Bill Clinton, will speak alongside Ghaith al-Omaro, the former executive director of the American Task Force on Palestine. Their discussion will take the form of a panel moderated by Harvard Business School professor Deepak Malhotra. 

“Part of our job was to at least give some preparation to the student body, because the guest speakers are going to assume some level of familiarity,” Nurenberg explained. “Now we at least aren’t sending the student body in blind, as it were.”

In terms of revisions for similar panels in the future, all three of the panelists cited the event venue as a challenge. “The setting was quite difficult, to be in the ACC for something like this,” said Gokce, “but I thought it went well given the resources and limitations.” Both Gokce and Emmott went on to comment about their preference for Straus’ more intimate environment.  

All three panelists hope that students, following the session, are inspired to act. “Even if students don’t remember the facts,” Nurenberg said, “[I hope] they walk away with the understanding that different parties in a conflict can have very different stories about it, and that both those stories can be valid at the same time.”

Gokce anticipates that the event will spark further community conversations. “We tried to lay the basic groundwork. You should be intrigued enough by the discussions that we have in assemblies and in classrooms to follow up on your own and find material to further educate yourself on the topic.”

 “This isn’t a kind of event where you just move on,” Emmott concluded, encouraging students to pay attention to other global issues. “Voter registration, climate advocacy…there’s always something you can do.”