Sweet! Arab-Jewish run Ice Cream Shop in Israel

What were you saying about apartheid again?

Its an "Only in Israel" story. Where else could a  Jew and an Arab open a gelato shop and  sell hummus ice cream to the masses?   Adam Ziv and Alaa Sawitat opened Bouza (“ice cream” in Arabic) last July, and they've been delighting everyone every since.

“We’re not just a novelty of being a Muslim-Jewish coexistence ice cream store,” Ziv told Israel 21C “We make ice cream that people like.”

“From the moment I thought of opening an ice cream parlor, I looked for a place near Kibbutz Sasa that would also be cool,” Ziv told Hazman Hayarok newspaper. “I thought it would be amazing to build a business that is co-run by Jews and Arabs, a place where Jews and Arabs would come. … The other day we looked outside and saw people from a Jewish village in the Galilee sitting beside a group of Arab youths from Tarshiha. A friend of mine looked at me and said, ‘So, this is the new Middle East.’”

Ziv makes use of his marketplace location. On Saturday mornings he buys fresh ingredients from local farmers. He then employs older Tarshiha women, looking for added income, to help him prepare the fruits for his ice cream.

“Anything with nuts – hazelnuts, pine nuts, pistachio – these are our big sellers,” says Ziv. “We try some Middle Eastern mixes like pomegranate and lemongrass or chocolate and spearmint. We’re still working on a kanafeh [sweet Palestinian cheese pastry] flavored ice cream but haven’t found the right recipe yet. I don’t want to be too pretentious when making new flavors. Our motto is ‘simply ice cream’ – and that’s what we do. We make great ice cream for our customers.”

Read all about Bourza here  and here

 Adam Ziv is absolutely right when he states ‘Coexistence’ and ‘peace’ are empty terms if you don’t really put them into practice. You can give speeches all day long, or you can just go out and do something."   The true peacemakers know that peaceful co-existence is nurtured  through stronger cultural and social  ties and that the the true path of peace is not achieved through isolation, but rather through active engagement.