Planting Peacer Profile: Nicolas Attallah

My name is Nicolas Atallah, I am a Palestinian living in East Jerusalem, an occupied territory by Israel. I am 25 year old, I have a B.A in Communication and Political Science, and now working in Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation theology Center, that seeks a Just Peace for the Palestinians who suffers daily from the Occupation, we work with the community and especially the young adults who suffers the most from the 43 year old occupation.
Being a Palestinian living in Jerusalem is not an easy life at all, we face daily obstacles, enormous ones, when I step out of my house every day I am usually not sure that I am coming back, its a daily battle for surviving, I start my regular days with checkpoints that are monitored by Israeli soldiers that prevents us the Palestinians from easy traveling all around the West Bank or Even inside Jerusalem, after standing in line for hours waiting to pass these checkpoints, another obstacle will appear directly, now I need to deal and face the discrimination, the stereotypes built upon me as a Palestinian living in Jerusalem, the Government doesn’t even recognize me as a citizen, I am just a resident, that must pay more taxes for the same services that other Israeli gets, and with a bunch more taxes just to get the privilege that I am living in Israel, and if I can’t afford, my Identity as a Jerusalemite resident will be taken away, and I will be another refugee suffering from the lake of services, and unrecognized by other countries, eventually to be added to the huge number of Palestinian refugees living in misery and in refugee camps. If I survived all of the above, it’s still not the end, when the dark comes, and sun falls from the sky, another nightmare starts, Palestinians living in Jerusalem, suffers also from Home Demolition, and the occupation Bulldozers usually comes after midnight to demolish a house in the Palestinian neighborhood, so every morning we thank God that we still have a roof above our heads, and a place to sleep in the cold nights, while an unfortunate Palestinian family just lost their house that other night.
However, I usually find my comfort zone in my work, when I work with the young adults living in Jerusalem, that usually faces the loss of Identity, high rates of unemployment, Poverty, Discrimination, Homeless. When I look at their eyes, and I can see the fear of the future, it even encourages me more to show them the way to find a better understanding of the future, by giving them the right tools to discover a new system of living and new opportunities to explore in their own messed up world, to reach their inner peace.
In the end, I would like to say that the solution for every conflict in this world is in the hands of the peacemakers of this world, they need to enlighten all the nations and speak up about the importance of Peace and Harmony, and to bring the concept of sharing into the surface, in order to put pressure on every government in this world, who are usually the benefiters of other nations conflict.