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• Official site for Inheriting the Holy Land
• Essay by Ms. Miller
• Seeds of Peace

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Tavis: Jennifer Miller is a freelance writer who came to know the conflict in the Middle East through her parents. Her father was a State Department negotiator; her mother helped bring Middle Eastern youth to the U.S. through a program called Seeds of Peace. Her new book is called "Inheriting the Holy Land, An American's Search for Hope in the Middle East.' Jennifer, nice to have you on the program.

Jennifer Miller: Thanks for having me on, Tavis.

Tavis: So you know you're still young when you walk on the set and you tell the host, I'm not 25, I'm 26 now. So you know you're still young when you walk on the set and you tell the host, I'm not 25, I'm 26 now. (Laughs) I told her, she's gonna start going the other way in a few years. (Laughs) Twenty-five when she did the book deal, 26 now, nice to have you on the program either way.

I mentioned the new Prime Minister, Mr. Olmert, in Israel. You've met this gentleman before.

Miller: I did. I met him, actually, while he was still deputy prime minister, when I was researching "Inheriting the Holy Land.' And I met him at a very critical time; it was right when they were announcing their plans for a possible withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. So, this was a couple of years ago.

Tavis: Yeah. What's your sense now of his being the prime minister?

Miller: Well, he is as firm in his conviction about pulling back from the Palestinian territories as he was when I met him the first time. He said, "This is a definite split that we have to make." He said, "I'm the one who came up with this idea, even." So now that he's prime minister, I think he's pretty determined to go ahead with it.

Tavis: What's your sense of what that means, combined with the statements of late of Mr. Abbas, that maybe we should have a conversation, and talk about?

Miller: It's a really difficult time. I also met Prime Minister Abbas as well, when I was visiting Ramallah. And I was very much struck by his ability to communicate very clearly. His articulateness, and really his commitment, I think, to progress in a peaceful manner. Unfortunately, as we know from the elections with Hamas, there is now a front that is opposing his plan to do that.

Tavis: Let me ask whether or not, not whether or not, but how, in fact, you put into perspective, into a proper context, what it means, thanks to your father and other connections here, to have this kind of access at such a young age to a crisis that is on the front pages of papers every day around the world?

Miller: Well, being involved in Israeli-Palestinian affairs has completely reshaped the way that I view the world. I grew up in Chevy Chase, Maryland, which is an upper middle class community, pretty homogenous. And then when I first sent to Seeds of Peace, which is this program that brings Israeli and Arab teenagers to the Middle East, here I am, this White American Jewish girl, suddenly thrown into this incredible environment of diversity that I'd never experienced before.

And it really taught me that you have to look for as many perspectives as possible if you're going to try to understand a complicated situation. You can't close your mind to anything.

Tavis: I want you to tell me about this program, Seeds for Peace, in just a moment, but let me take you back right quick to your first trip to Israel. And I ask this only because now you're allowing me to reminisce when I was younger. When I was your age, maybe a little bit younger, matter of fact, a little bit younger, I took my first trip as a part of group similar to this, to Israel, went all over the country.

And to your point about how it changes your life, I will never forget my first trip there, and particularly going to Yad Vashem, which I'm sure you've been to, the museum there. It changed my life in any number of ways, which we ain't got time to talk about. This ain't about me anyway, it's about you. But take me back and tell me what your first trip was like. I'm fascinated to compare my thoughts to yours.

Miller: Right, well, I was 13 at the time.

Tavis: You were 13. You were a bit younger, even.

Miller: The time of my first trip. It was kind of a present for my bat mitzvah, which of course is kind of the coming of age into the Jewish community. And it was really a historical-based trip. We really went around the country to see places of biblical history, places of medieval history. But one experience that I remember that has really stood out to me, we were going through the old city with my parents in Jerusalem, and there was a man selling Israeli army t-shirts.

And I asked my parents for one. And when I got this shirt, I wore it to school, like, every day. I thought I was the coolest kid in school because I was wearing this emblem of might and power. At the age of 13, I never for a second thought about it as a political symbol. And today, if you walk around the streets at my university, for example, where I went to school, if I were to wear that shirt, I would be making a very definitive political statement. And it's just interesting, when you're young, and you don't necessarily understand implications of what you see around you.

Tavis: Tell me about the Seeds for Peace program.

Miller: Well, Seeds for Peace is incredible in that it takes young Israelis and Arabs who have never had the ability to confront one another peacefully and to express their emotions and the pain that they've gone through. It puts them in a safe, secure environment, and it really allows them to communicate to one another, and teaches them the skills on how to do that in a respectful way.

And it changes these kids' lives, because for the first time, they're really empowered to not only speak their minds, but also to listen. You have to be empowered to listen. You can't just shut off. If you feel violent and angry, you don't listen.

Tavis: You talked to young people in the writing of this text, obviously. What's your, it's hard to generalize, so you may wanna just pull a couple of stories out here that make sense to you, or that come to your mind immediately. What's your sense of what you hear these days, though, when you talk to young persons who happen to be Jewish, and young persons who happen to be on the Palestinian side of this issue?

Miller: Right. Well, there's a similarity. There are many differences, but there's one similarity. On the surface with a lot of these kids, there really is a rhetoric of anger and hatred. But when you get below the rhetoric, when you really, when I sat down and I really asked these kids, what did they want out of life? What are their goals? They just wanna be productive citizens in their societies.

If they had the opportunity to be productive citizens in a peaceful way, I know 100 percent that they would take that opportunity. And I'll give you one anecdote that I think really illustrates this very well. I was walking down the street one day in a poor neighbor in Ramallah. Came across a group of teenage boys, just hanging out on the street.

Went to talk to them. And after, they railed against the United States and against Israel for maybe 20 minutes. And then as I turned to leave, they started begging me for U.S. visas. As though I could just (laughs) produce a visa out of my back pocket. And I said, 'You've just talked to me for 20 minutes about how much you hate the U.S. Why do you wanna come to my country?'

And they looked at me and they said, 'We wanna be like you. We wanna live in a place where the streets are clean, where the government listens to the people.' They said, 'Abu Amar' - that's the nickname for Yasser Arafat - 'He's a loser.' They said this to me. He's a loser. And it just goes to show you, I think, that these kids, what they really want is a productive, meaningful way of life. They don't wanna go towards violence. But unfortunately, their leaders are not providing them other opportunities.

Tavis: I'm fascinated by your phrase, rhetoric of anger. On the surface, what you get is a rhetoric of anger, until you get below the surface. Who's putting, where are they getting this language? Who's putting, instilling in them, this rhetoric of anger?

Miller: Well, it's coming from a variety of sources. A lot of it is just influences from daily life, especially in the West Bank and Gaza. As kids told me, they grow up with the sounds of explosions. And the Israelis, too. In my apartment, and I was living in a very nice area of Jerusalem for the six months that I was there, one night, 11:00 P.M., huge pop.

Like a plane breaking the sound barrier. A café had been blown up just a block away. And the Palestinians are experiencing similar things. So, this anger that they feel, this intense emotion, a lot of it comes from around them. I know that there's a lot of controversy over what's being taught in the schools and the textbooks, and I looked very closely into Israeli and Palestinian textbooks in "Inheriting the Holy Land.' And yes, some of it is coming from that. But I would say the majority of this is really what these kids experience on a daily basis.

Tavis: Let me ask you, to your point, let me ask the flip side of the point you made a moment ago. You made a point a moment ago about some young Palestinians who said they wanted to be like you; they wanna come to this country where the government listens to the people. I'm not sure they got that part right, (laughs) but I digress on that point. But I understand the point you were trying to make. What can American students, American young people, learn from the young people in that region of the world?

Miller: Right. Well, I've thought a lot about this. I would say living in the Middle East really changed my perception of who I am as an American. And I don't think I ever really appreciated the security that I have in this country. I don't think I really appreciated the ability to identify as an individual, and not necessarily as a member of a national group, or to identify, I don't have to identify an opposition to a country that's trying to annihilate me.

And I think it's important for young American kids, 'cause I was one of them, to really appreciate, to try to appreciate the security and the freedom that we have here. And part of that appreciation, I think, means actively going out and trying to expose yourself to other ideas, other opinions that maybe are difficult for you to hear, but it really helps you understand how so many people around the world, the life that they live on a daily basis.

Tavis: Let me ask you in 20 quick seconds here whether or not you think the rhetoric of anger is seeping in too deeply, or are you hopeful here that this next generation might be able to address this issue?

Miller: I think it is seeping in deeply, but my conviction, from talking to kids from all walks of life in the Middle East, is that if they are given the opportunity to see another side to the story, they are just eager to take that opportunity.

Tavis: I used to hate it when I was a young person and people used to call me articulate. So I'm not call Jennifer Miller articulate, but she's awfully wise beyond her years, and her book is a wonderful read. "Inheriting the Holy Land, An American's Search for Hope in the Middle East,' written by Jennifer Miller. Remember the name, I'm certain you're gonna hear it again and again and again. Jennifer Miller, nice to have you on the program.

Miller: Thank you so much, Tavis.

Tavis: All the best to you. Up next on this program, actor Richard E. Grant. Stay with us.