Leyla Katz

Being the Infidel Leyla Katz

Three little words - How did this happen? I was looking for politics, not sex or passion. Three little words and a nice Israeli Jewish girl in the UK and a proud Palestinian Muslim from New York are battling to change each others' hearts and minds. Perhaps we're trying to make peace online, trying to understand our rewritten histories and our difficult, terror-fuelled realities. We crave a connection ... and to make sense of this social media world and the real world conflict it supports. This is a very modern Romeo & Juliet story, where vicious images of death and 140 character insults and insights whizz across the ether. This is a place of memes and avatars, where we try to settle lies and hopes whose roots are as old as the Bible. "Out there" we fight. "In here," in our private Direct Messaging space, this unknown man and I build something .... unlooked for, unexpected, not exactly unwanted. Night after night.. and we're 3,500 miles apart! What on earth is the future for people like us? What happens to our friendship, our frenemyship? We are each part of a tribe in the 21st century and our tribes demonise the dangerous Other... Three little words. I hate you. You're a liar. Who are you? Are you horny? WHAT!!? Welcome to our words, to faith and fury and to the Middle East "peace" process... on Twitter.