NEW YORK -- As the son of a Lebanese pacifist, I am dismayed by the widening gap between Palestinians and Israelis that make a possible solution to the con- flict between them seem even more distant.
In Tucumen, a town in northern Argentina where my father chose to live, he was a cofounder of a cultural Athenaeum, an event that brought together the most important figures of the day to lecture on cultural issues.
The Athenaeum, named after the famous Lebanese poet Gibran Khalil Gibran, was housed in the Syrio-Lebanese Society, an organization formed by a group of Syrian and Lebanese expatriates. Before the advent of the Athenaeum, the main activities at that society had been social events and gambling.