Now THIS is progress

When professor Mohammed Dajani of the Palestinian Al-Quds University took 27 of his students along with Israeli students to visit Auschwitz in March, he came home to find himself called a traitor by some of his associates. They said he and his students had "acted in their personal capacity and were not representatives of the university."

Dajani responded with these words on April 10 via Facebook:

"My response to all this tirade is that my duty as a teacher is to teach, to have my students explore the unexplored, to open new horizons for my students, to guide my students out of the cave of perceptions and misperceptions to see the facts and the reality on the ground, to break the walls of silence, to demolish the fences of taboos, to swim against the tide in search of truth... I will go to Ramallah, I will go to the university, I will put my photos of the visit on Facebook, and I do not regret for one second what I did. As a matter of fact, I will do it again if given the opportunity. I will not hide, I will not deny. I will not be silent. I will not remain a bystander even if the victims of the suffering I show empathy for are my perpetrators and my occupiers. The aim is not to get any one's approval but to do the right thing."

The program is called "Hearts Of Flesh, Not Stone," from the Book of the Prophet Ezequiel (36:26):  “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.”