TBN Video Summary - In Our Neighborhood, Mati Shoshani Interviews Rawan Osman

Mati introduces Rawan Osman, a woman who is of mixed Lebanese and Syrian heritage who grew up in a Muslim family but attended Christian schools. She lived in Europe for many years and came to visit Israel after October 7th to find out for herself what was going on here. She decided to do it, even though it meant that she could never again visit Lebanon or Syria because, as she said, she was "choosing a side" and rejecting all the hatred and vitriol against Israel which laid the groundwork for the massacre of October 7th.

She said that there were many Muslims who live in Western countries who did not approve of the October 7th attacks but they're afraid to speak up about it because their community is so hostile to Israel. But Rawan decided that she wasn't going to be afraid of this backlash anymore because someone has to speak out against all the lies and the hate otherwise the situation is never going to improve and the terrorists will control the future.

She also relates that for several months before October 7th she'd been in a process to convert to Orthodox Judaism. She was raised in a Muslim family but had always been an atheist. Now she wants to be part of the Jewish people and she wants the Jewish people, and everyone else, to know about it. She wants to embrace the Jewish people and join her destiny to theirs.

She says that the pro-Israel camp is dramatically outnumbered in the world but she also knows that it will prevail because it can still make distinctions between right and wrong and the other side has largely lost the ability to do that.

But Mati asks her if it's necessary to become a Jew in order to support Israel and she says no, that a devout Moslem can still do that but first they must unlearn a lot of things that Moslems are taught about Israel and the Jewish people and learn the truth instead. She has begin sharing about her experiences in Arabic on social media so that others can learn these things for themselves.

She explains to Mati that most Arabs and Moslems are unaware of many things that are relevant to the discussion about Israel and the Palestinians. They are taught many false narratives in school and they are also taught that it is forbidden to question these false narratives.

This is literally called "anti-normalization" and it is the official policy of most Arab and Moslem countries towards Israel.

Rawan goes on to explain that this is specifically the case in regards to education about the Holocaust and also the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7th. There is a flat denial of these events and the magnitude of the atrocities in many places, and this is maintained even though the evidence is available for anyone to see and understand it.

Mati then raises the issue that for many Westerners that might not gaslight themselves by saying these events didn't happen, but they will deny that it's any of their business. They will say to themselves that this is something that might not be very nice, but it's happening to someone else far away. What they don't realize, Mati says, is that these bad things won't stay in the Middle East. They'll start happening in America, Canada, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and everywhere else. In fact, there are already some very disturbing things happening in Europe and the US, and the governments, media and other institutions there have no idea how to deal with it.

Rawan agrees and gives the example of Syria, which was torn apart by a civil war started by the regime of Bashar al-Assad. The world let Assad get away with it and hundreds of thousands of Syrians left their country and migrated to Europe. They have not integrated into their host countries, but instead they have brought many terribly attitudes and cultural norms with them. This includes misogyny and anti-Semitism, and the results have horrified Europeans, but again, they really don't know what to do about it.

Rawan also mentions the far-Left, which has romanticized Hamas and called them "freedom fighters."

Next Mati asks her what motivates her to continue doing what she's doing and she replies by saying "imuna" which is the Hebrew word for "faith."

She tells the story of how she was always an atheist despite being raised in the Moslem culture but when she came to faith in the God described in the Bible it opened her eyes and gave her a reason to keep going. She said she feels sympathy for people who don't have that motivation.

She also says that the story of the Jewish People which she is converting to join is the story of God helping these people in many terrible situations all throughout history, and He will help them in this situation as well.

SHe also says that she feels like she owes it to her children and their children that the world will not be ruled by Hamas and the Mullahs of Iran. They will have a different future.

Mati then asks her how she identifies herself, since she's had so many cultural and political inputs in her life from living in different countries and cultures.

She replies that she identifies as a mother, who is very angry after October 7th because the world her children are growing up in is so dangerous. She says that it's time to solve the Middle East conflict so that more children will not have to grow up living in the same kind of fear that she grew up with in Lebanon during the wars there and many children have lived with in Syria over the past decade.

She says that when she sees people angry about the conditions of children in Gaza today, she wonders where they were for the past decades when hundreds of thousands of Lebanese and Syrian children lived through so much violence and terror.

She also describes the process by which she came to be interested in Judaism and says that this awakened her to the fact that the Jewish and Arab people, of which she feels to a part of both, need her to stand up for the truth and against the lies and hatred which is threatening them both.

Mati concludes by thanking her for this commitment to the truth and moral clarity.

But she says that it needs to be normal to do such things, and that's the kind of world she's working towards.