On March 14, this year, I posted this poster on Facebook. This is an image of me and my daughter holding the Israeli flag. I will try to explain to you about the context of why and when I posted.
14. marta ove godine, okačio sam ovaj poster na svom Fejsbuk profilu. Ovo je slika mene i moje ćerke kako držimo izraelsku zastavu. Pokušaću da vam objasnim kontekst razloga i vremena kad sam ga okačio.
A few days ago, I was sitting waiting on the line at the grocery store, and the owner and one of the clients were talking to each other, and the owner was explaining to the client that we're going to get 10,000 missiles on Israel. And the client was saying, no, it's 10,000 a day. (Laughter)
Pre nekoliko dana, čekao sam u redu u prodavnici, a vlasnik i jedan od klijenata su pričali i vlasnik je objašnjavao klijentu da ćemo poslati 10.000 projektila na Izrael. Klijent je govorio: "Ne, već 10.000 na dan." (Smeh)
("10,000 missiles") This is the context. This is where we are now in Israel. We have this war with Iran coming for 10 years now, and we have people, you know, afraid. It's like every year it's the last minute that we can do something about the war with Iran. It's like, if we don't act now, it's too late forever, for 10 years now.
("10.000 projektila") Ovo je kontekst. Mi smo sada ovde u Izraelu. Imamo taj rat sa Iranom koji se priprema već 10 godina i imamo ljude koji su uplašeni. Kao da je svake godine poslednji trenutak da preduzmemo nešto povodom rata sa Iranom. Ukoliko sad nešto ne preduzmemo, kasno je zauvek i tako već 10 godina.
So at some point it became, you know, to me, I'm a graphic designer, so I made posters about it and I posted the one I just showed you before. Most of the time, I make posters, I post them on Facebook, my friends like it, don't like it, most of the time don't like it, don't share it, don't nothing, and it's another day. So I went to sleep, and that was it for me. And later on in the night, I woke up because I'm always waking up in the night, and I went by the computer and I see all these red dots, you know, on Facebook, which I've never seen before. (Laughter) And I was like, "What's going on?" So I come to the computer and I start looking on, and suddenly I see many people talking to me, most of them I don't know, and a few of them from Iran, which is -- What? Because you have to understand, in Israel we don't talk with people from Iran. We don't know people from Iran. It's like, on Facebook, you have friends only from -- it's like your neighbors are your friends on Facebook. And now people from Iran are talking to me.
U jednom trenutku sam odlučio da preduzmem nešto, ja sam grafički dizajner i napravio sam postere o tome i postavio sam onaj koji sam vam već pokazao. Većinu vremena pravim postere i postavljam ih na Fejsbuk, mojim prijateljima se ili sviđaju ili ne, uglavnom im se ne sviđaju, ne dele ih, ništa ne rade i svane novi dan. Otišao sam na spavanje i to je bilo to što se mene tiče. Probudio sam se tokom noći, uvek se budim tokom noći i otišao sam do kompjutera i video sve te crvene tačke na Fejsbuku, koje nikad ranije nisam video. (Smeh) Pitao sam se: "Šta se dešava?" prišao sam kompjuteru i počeo pregledati i odjednom sam video mnoge ljude kako pričaju sa mnom, većinu nisam poznavao, i nekoliko njih iz Irana što je - šta? Morate da shvatite, mi u Izraelu ne pričamo sa ljudima iz Irana. Ne pozanjemo ljude iz Irana. Na Fejsbuku, imate prijatelje samo iz - prijatelji su vam komšije. A sad ljudi iz Irana pričaju sa mnom.
So I start answering this girl, and she's telling me she saw the poster and she asked her family to come, because they don't have a computer, she asked her family to come to see the poster, and they're all sitting in the living room crying.
I tako ja počnem da odgovaram jednoj devojci, a ona mi govori kako je videla poster i kako je zamolila svoju porodicu da dođu, jer oni nemaju kompjuter, zamolila ih je da dođu da vide poster i oni svi sede u dnevnoj sobi i plaču.
So I'm like, whoa. I ask my wife to come, and I tell her, you have to see that. People are crying, and she came, she read the text, and she started to cry. And everybody's crying now. (Laughter)
Bio sam zaprepašten. Pozvao sam svoju ženu da dođe i rekao joj da mora da vidi to. Ljudi plaču i ona je došla, pročitala tekst i takođe počela da plače. Odjednom svi plaču. (Smeh)
So I don't know what to do, so my first reflex, as a graphic designer, is, you know, to show everybody what I'd just seen, and people started to see them and to share them, and that's how it started. The day after, when really it became a lot of talking, I said to myself, and my wife said to me, I also want a poster, so this is her. (Laughter) Because it's working, put me in a poster now.
Nisam znao šta da radim, moja prva reakcija, kao grafičkog dizajnera je da pokažem svima šta sam upravo video i ljudi su to videli i počeli da dele i tako je sve počelo. Dan posle, kada se već mnogo pričalo o tome, rekao sam sebi i supruga mi je rekla, ja takođe želim poster, ovo je ona. (Smeh) Pošto ima efekta, stavi me sad na poster.
But more seriously, I was like, okay, these ones work, but it's not just about me, it's about people from Israel who want to say something. So I'm going to shoot all the people I know, if they want, and I'm going to put them in a poster and I'm going to share them.
Šalu na stranu, shvatio sam, OK, ovi su upalili, ali nisam samo ja u pitanju, već i ljudi iz Izraela koji žele da kažu nešto. I zato ću da slikam sve ljude koje znam, ako žele, staviću ih na poster i podeliću to sa svima.
So I went to my neighbors and friends and students and I just asked them, give me a picture, I will make you a poster. And that's how it started. And that's how, really, it's unleashed, because suddenly people from Facebook, friends and others, just understand that they can be part of it. It's not just one dude making one poster, it's -- we can be part of it, so they start sending me pictures and ask me, "Make me a poster. Post it. Tell the Iranians we from Israel love you too." It became, you know, at some point it was really, really intense. I mean, so many pictures, so I asked friends to come, graphic designers most of them, to make posters with me, because I didn't have the time. It was a huge amount of pictures. So for a few days, that's how my living room was.
Otišao sam kod komšija, prijatelja i studenata i pitao sam ih da mi dozvole da ih slikam a ja ću im napraviti poster. I tako je počelo. I tako je, zapravo, zaživelo, jer su odjednom ljudi sa Fejsbuka, prijatelji i drugi, shvatili da mogu da budu deo toga. Nije to samo neki lik koji pravi poster, već - možemo da učestvujemo i počeli su mi slati slike moleći me: "Napravite meni jedan poster. Podelite ga. Poručite Irancima da ih mi iz Izraela takođe volimo." U jednom trenutku bilo je zaista, zaista naporno. Toliko slika, pa sam zamolio prijatelje da dođu, takođe grafičke dizajnere većinom, i da prave postere sa mnom, jer ja nisam imao vremena. Bila je to ogromna količina slika. Tako je izgledala moja soba nekoliko dana.
And we received Israeli posters, Israeli images, but also lots of comments, lots of messages from Iran. And we took these messages and we made posters out of it, because I know people: They don't read, they see images. If it's an image, they may read it.
Dobijali smo izraelske postere, slike, ali i dosta komentara i poruka iz Irana. Napravili smo postere i od tih poruka, jer znam ljude: oni ne čitaju, oni vide slike. Ako je slika, možda će je i pročitati.
So here are a few of them.
Pa evo nekoliko postera.
("You are my first Israelian friend. I wish we both get rid of our idiot politicians, anyway nice to see you!")
("Ti si moj prvi prijatelj Izraelac. Želim da se obojica rešimo naših idiota političara, kako god, bilo mi je drago!")
("I love that blue. I love that star. I love that flag.") This one is really moving for me because it's the story of a girl who has been raised in Iran to walk on an Israeli flag to enter her school every morning, and now that she sees the posters that we're sending, she starts -- she said that she changed her mind, and now she loves that blue, she loves that star, and she loves that flag, talking about the Israeli flag, and she wished that we'd meet and come to visit one another, and just a few days after I posted the first poster.
("Volim tu plavu. Volim tu zvezdu. Volim tu zastavu.") Ovaj je posebno emotivan za mene jer je priča o devojci koja je vaspitana u Iranu da gazi po izraelskoj zastavi svakog jutra pri ulasku u školu, a sada kada je videla naše postere, rekla mi je da je promenila mišljenje i sada voli tu plavu boju, tu zvezdu i voli tu zastavu, misleći na izraelsku zastavu, poželela je da se sretnemo i posetimo i to samo nekoliko dana pošto sam postavio prvi poster.
The day after, Iranians started to respond with their own posters. They have graphic designers. What? (Laughter) Crazy, crazy. So you can see they are still shy, they don't want to show their faces, but they want to spread the message. They want to respond. They want to say the same thing. So. And now it's communication. It's a two-way story. It's Israelis and Iranians sending the same message, one to each other.
Dan posle, Iranci su počeli da odgovaraju svojim posterima. Imaju grafičke dizajnere. Šta? (Smeh) Ludo, ludo. Kao što vidite, još uvek su stidljivi, ne žele da pokažu svoja lica, ali žele da šire poruku. Žele da odgovore. Žele da poruče istu stvar. I sada je to komunikacija. Dvostrana priča. Izraelci i Iranci šalju istu poruku jedni drugima.
("My Israeli Friends. I don't hate you. I don't want War.")
("Moji izraelski prijatelji. Ne mrzim vas. Ne želim rat.")
This never happened before, and this is two people supposed to be enemies, we're on the verge of a war, and suddenly people on Facebook are starting to say, "I like this guy. I love those guys." And it became really big at some point.
Ovo se nikad ranije nije desilo, a radi se o ljudima koji bi trebalo da budu neprijatelji, na ivici smo rata i odjednom ljudi na Fejsbuku počinju da govore: "Sviđa mi se ovaj čovek. Sviđaju mi se ti ljudi." I postalo je zaista veliko u jednom trenutku.
And then it became news. Because when you're seeing the Middle East, you see only the bad news. And suddenly, there is something that was happening that was good news. So the guys on the news, they say, "Okay, let's talk about this." And they just came, and it was so much,
A onda je postalo vest. Kada gledate Srednji Istok, vidite samo loše vesti. I odjednom se dešavalo nešto što je dobra vest. Ljudi na vestima kažu: "OK, hajde da pričamo o ovome." I jednostavno su došli, nije baš bilo lako.
I remember one day, Michal, she was talking with the journalist, and she was asking him, "Who's gonna see the show?"And he said, "Everybody."
Sećam se jednog dana, Mihal je pričala sa novinarom i pitala ga je: "Ko će sve videti emisiju?" A on je odgovorio: "Svi."
So she said, "Everybody in Palestine, in where? Israel? Who is everybody?""Everybody."
Na to ga ona pita: "Svi u Palestini ili gde? Izraelu? Ko su ti svi?" "Svi."
They said, "Syria?" "Syria."
"Sirija?" "Sirija."
"Lebanon?""Lebanon." At some point, he just said, "40 million people are going to see you today. It's everybody." The Chinese. And we were just at the beginning of the story.
"Liban?" "Liban." U jednom trenutku je samo rekao: "40 miliona ljudi će vas gledati danas. To su ti svi." Kinezi. A tek smo na početku priče.
Something crazy also happened. Every time a country started talking about it, like Germany, America, wherever, a page on Facebook popped up with the same logo with the same stories, so at the beginning we had "Iran-Loves-Israel," which is an Iranian sitting in Tehran, saying, "Okay, Israel loves Iran? I give you Iran-Loves-Israel." You have Palestine-Loves-Israel. You have Lebanon that just -- a few days ago. And this whole list of pages on Facebook dedicated to the same message, to people sending their love, one to each other.
Nešto ludo se takođe desilo. Svaki put kada bi neka zemlja počela pričati o tome, kao Nemačka, Amerika, koja god, nova stranica bi osvanula na Fejsbuku sa istim logom istim pričama, tako da smo na početku imali "Iran-voli-Izrael", što je iranski odgovor iz Teherana koji kaže: "OK, Izrael voli Iran? Dajem vam Iran-voli-Izrael". Imate i Palestina-voli-Izrael. Imate i Liban, to je od pre samo nekoliko dana. I čitavu listu stranica na Fejsbuku posvećenih istoj poruci, ljudima koji šalju poruke ljubavi jedni drugima.
The moment I really understood that something was happening, a friend of mine told me, "Google the word 'Israel.'" And those were the first images on those days that popped up from Google when you were typing, "Israel" or "Iran." We really changed how people see the Middle East. Because you're not in the Middle East. You're somewhere over there, and then you want to see the Middle East, so you go on Google and you say, "Israel," and they give you the bad stuff. And for a few days you got those images. Today the Israel-Loves-Iran page is this number, 80,831, and two million people last week went on the page and shared, liked, I don't know, commented on one of the photos.
Trenutak kad sam stvarno shvatio da se nešto dešava, prijatelj mi je rekao, "Izguglaj reč 'Izrael'." To su bile prve slike koje su tih dana bile rezultat Gugl pretrage kad ste ukucali: "Izrael" ili "Iran". Zaista smo promenili način na koji ljudi doživljavaju Srednji Istok. Jer vi niste na Bliskom Istoku. Vi ste negde tamo i želite da vidite Bliski Istok, odete na Gugl i napišete: "Izrael" i daju vam sve najgore stvari. I nekoliko dana biste imali te slike u glavi. Danas je Izrael-voli-Iran stranica koja broji 80.831 člana i dva miliona ljudi je prošle nedelje posetilo stranicu i šerovalo, lajkovalo, ne znam ni sam, komentarisalo neku od slika.
So for five months now, that's what we are doing, me, Michal, a few of my friends, are just making images. We're showing a new reality by just making images because that's how the world perceives us. They see images of us, and they see bad images. So we're working on making good images. End of story.
To je ono što radimo već pet meseci, ja, Mihal, nekoliko prijatelja, jednostavno pravimo slike. Pokazujemo novu realnost prosto praveći slike jer nas na taj način svet zapaža. Vide slike nas i vide loše slike. Mi radimo na stvaranju dobrih slika. Kraj priče.
Look at this one. This is the Iran-Loves-Israel page. This is not the Israel-Loves-Iran. This is not my page. This is a guy in Tehran on the day of remembrance of the Israeli fallen soldier putting an image of an Israeli soldier on his page. This is the enemy. What?
Pogledajte ovu. Ovo je Iran-voli-Izrael stranica. Ovo nije Izrael-voli-Iran. Nije moja stranica. Ovo je čovek u Teheranu koji na dan sećanja na pale izraelske vojnike stavlja sliku izraelskog vojnika na svoju stranicu. Ovo je neprijatelj. Šta?
("Our heartfelt condolences to the families who lost their dearests in terror attack in Bulgaria")
("Naše najiskrenije saučešće porodicama koje su izgubile svoje najdraže u terorističkom napadu u Bugarskoj")
And it's going both ways. It's like, we are showing respect, one to each other. And we're understanding. And you show compassion. And you become friends. And at some point, you become friends on Facebook, and you become friends in life. You can go and travel and meet people. And I was in Munich a few weeks ago. I went there to open an exposition about Iran and I met there with people from the page that told me, "Okay, you're going to be in Europe, I'm coming. I'm coming from France, from Holland, from Germany," of course, and from Israel people came, and we just met there for the first time in real life. I met with people that are supposed to be my enemies for the first time. And we just shake hands, and have a coffee and a nice discussion, and we talk about food and basketball. And that was the end of it. Remember that image from the beginning? At some point we met in real life, and we became friends.
I obostrano je. To je zapravo međusobno iskazivanje poštovanja. Razumevanja. Samilosti. I postajete prijatelji. U jednom trenutku se sprijateljite na Fejsbuku i postanete prijatelji i uživo. Možete da putujete i upoznajete ljude. Bio sam u Minhenu pre nekoliko nedelja. Otišao sam da otvorim izložbu o Iranu i sreo sam se tamo sa ljudima sa stranice koji su mi rekli: "OK, bićete u Evropi, dolazim. Dolazim iz Francuske, Holandije, Nemačke." Naravno, došli su i ljudi iz Izraela i sreli smo se uživo prvi put u životu. Sreo sam se sa ljudima koji bi trebalo da mi budu neprijatelji, prvi put. Rukovali smo se, popili kafu i imali lepu diskusiju, pričali smo o hrani i košarci. I to je bio kraj te priče. Sećate se one slike sa početka? U jednom trenutku života smo se upoznali i postali prijatelji.
And it goes the other way around. Some girl that we met on Facebook never been in Israel, born and raised in Iran, lives in Germany, afraid of Israelis because of what she knows about us, decides after a few months of talking on the Internet with some Israelis to come to Israel, and she gets on the plane and arrives at Ben Gurion and says, "Okay, not that big a deal."
Deluje to i povratno. Neka devojka koju smo sreli na Fejsbuku koja nikad nije bila u Izraelu, rođena i odgojena u Iranu, živi u Nemačkoj, plaši se Izraelaca zbog stvari koje zna o nama, odluči nakon par meseci priče preko interneta sa nekim Izraelcima, da dođe u Izrael, ukrcala se u avion i stigla na Ben Gurion i rekla: "OK, mačji kašalj."
So a few weeks ago, the stress is getting higher, so we start this new campaign called "Not ready to die in your war." I mean, it's plus/minus the same message, but we wanted really to add some aggressivity to it. And again, something amazing happened, something that we didn't have on the first wave of the campaign. Now people from Iran, the same ones who were shy at the first campaign and just sent, you know, their foot and half their faces, now they're sending their faces, and they're saying, "Okay, no problem, we're into it. We are with you." Just read where those guys are from. And for every guy from Israel, you've got someone from Iran. Just people sending their pictures. Crazy, yes?
Pre nekoliko nedelja, stres raste i pokrećemo novu kampanju pod imenom: "Nisam spreman da umrem u vašem ratu." Manje-više ista poruka, s tim da smo hteli da je učinimo malo agresivnijom. I opet se nešto neverovatno desilo, nešto što nismo imali tokom prvog talasa kampanje. Odjednom ljudi iz Irana, isti oni koji su bili stidljivi tokom prve kampanje i slali samo sliku svoje noge ili pola lica sada šalju svoja lica i govore: "OK, nema problema, sviđa nam se. Sa vama smo:" Samo pročitajte odakle su ti ljudi. I za svakog čoveka iz Izraela imate nekoga iz Irana. Samo ljudi koji šalju svoje slike. Ludo, zar ne?
So -- (Applause)
Tako da - (Aplauz)
So you may ask yourself, who is this dude?
Možete se zapitati: "Ko je ovaj lik?"
My name is Ronny Edry, and I'm 41, I'm an Israeli, I'm a father of two, I'm a husband, and I'm a graphic designer. I'm teaching graphic design. And I'm not that naive, because a lot of the time I've been asked, many times I've been asked, "Yeah, but, this is really naive, sending flowers over, I mean — "
Zovem se Roni Endri, imam 41. godinu, Izraelac sam, otac dvoje dece, muž i grafički dizajner. Predajem grafički dizajn. Nisam toliko naivan, jer većinu vremena su me pitali, mnogo puta: "Da, ali, ovo je zaista naivno, slati cveće -"
I was in the army. I was in the paratroopers for three years, and I know how it looks from the ground. I know how it can look really bad. So to me, this is the courageous thing to do, to try to reach the other side before it's too late, because when it's going to be too late, it's going to be too late. And sometimes war is inevitable, sometimes, but maybe [with] effort, we can avoid it. Maybe as people, because especially in Israel, we're in a democracy. We have the freedom of speech, and maybe that little thing can change something. And really, we can be our own ambassadors. We can just send a message and hope for the best.
Bio sam u vojsci. Bio sam paravojnik tri godine i znam kako to izgleda. Znam da može izgledati zaista loše. Za mene, ovo je hrabra stvar, pokušaj da dopreš do druge strane pre nego što bude kasno jer kad je kasno, nema više povratka. Ponekad je rat neizbežan, ponekad, ali možda uz napore, možemo da ga izbegnemo. Možda kao narod, jer posebno u Izraelu, mi smo u demokratiji. Imamo slobodu govora i možda ta mala stvar može da promeni nešto. Možemo da budemo sami svoji ambasadori. Možemo jednostavno da pošaljemo poruku i nadamo se najboljem.
So I want to ask Michal, my wife, to come with me on the stage just to make with you one image, because it's all about images. And maybe that image will help us change something. Just raise that. Exactly. And I'm just going to take a picture of it, and I'm just going to post it on Facebook with kind of "Israelis for peace" or something.
Želim da pozovem svoju suprugu, Mihal, da dođe na pozornicu samo da naravimo sa vama jednu sliku, jer se sve svodi na slike. Možda će nam ta slika pomoći da promenimo nešto. Podignite to. Upravo tako. Samo ću da uslikam i da okačim na Fejsbuk sa porukom "Izraelci za mir" ili nekom sličnom.
Oh my God. Don't cry.
O bože. Nemoj da plačeš.
Thank you guys. (Applause)
Hvala vam ljudi. (Aplauz)