The most visible and well-known Jewish museum in the United States is the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Located in the cluster of national buildings in the heart of Washington, D.C. that includes the White House, Congress, the Smithsonian museums, the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial, the Holocaust Museum is the most visited Jewish museum in the United States. Over 24 million people have visited it since its doors opened in April 1993, including over 10 million schoolchildren, 2,700 officials from 131 countries and 80 heads of state. Impressive numbers.

While the $168 million was being raised to build the museum, the writer Jerzy Kosinski came out against building it, saying that it would reinforce for Jew and non-Jew the notion of Jew as victim. He said that a museum to Jewish history and culture should be built instead. It is telling to note that when Native Americans and African Americans work toward building their own museums, in that same historic location, they focus on the totality of their experiences and not only oppression. The National Museum of the American Indian does not focus singularly on the how Native Americans were murdered. The African American Museum is not only about slavery. They both present victimhood as part of their story, which must be told and not forgotten, but not the only story they wish to share. We Jews, on the other hand, seem unable to get past being a victim.

In many ways this is very understandable considering our history, but it is not healthy. Understanding oneself as a victim can also lead to paralysis - the inability to see other possibilities. The Zionist state, which was supposed to be the answer to this outlook and orientation, has in many ways failed in that regard. Such a victim-oriented outlook makes it easier for us to see all Arabs as being against us.

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I am not saying we should stick our heads in the sand and not recognize that there are Arabs who wish to destroy us. They must be taken seriously and responded to in a variety of ways. At the same time we must also recognize that not all Arabs wish us harm. We must strengthen our contact and relationship with moderate Palestinians and other Arabs who desire to live peacefully with us. However, when we act as though they are all against us, it only feeds a cycle that becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

A case in point is the example of the Palestinian doctoral student who recently petitioned the Israeli High Court to be allowed to study in Israel. There are hundreds like her. For years now the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies - the premier teaching and research program in the Middle East where future Arab and Jewish leaders are prepared to cooperatively solve the region's environmental challenges - has been unable to get permits for Palestinian students to study on its Kibbutz Ketura campus. In addition, getting visas for Jordanians who wish to study at the institute has become a very complicated process.

At present the Arava Institute has put together a coaltion that includes the office of U.S. Ambassador Richard Jones, USAID, MKs Orit Noked and Ami Ayalon, and Gisha - the Center for the Legal Protection of Freedom of Movement. This coalition is working to challenge and change the present Israeli policy of not issuing any new study permits for Palestinians, who have cleared security clearance from the Shin Bet, and who wish to study in Israel.

This continued policy flies in the face of the Agreement on Movement and Access that was signed by the United States, Israel and the Palestinian Authority in November 2005 when U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was in the region.

Over the past year a number of Palestinian students have applied to study at the Arava Institute. One plans, after he receives his training there, to "establish a nonviolent environmental NGO to help foster Palestinian civic society," while another wants to "learn to use the environment as an approach to peace-building between Palestinians and Israelis." A third looks to gain skills at the institute that will help him "conserve bio-diversity in the Palestinian Authority and raise public awareness of the issue within the PA." They have all been denied permission to study at the institute because of the present Israeli policy.

Both Israelis and Palestinians see each other as the victim of the other's words and deeds. With each act of violence fear increases, with each act of intolerance mistrust increases. With each of these actions the bridge to peace narrows. Overcoming the paralysis of fear of victimhood is one of the great challenges of this conflict. As Rabbi Nachman reminds us, "The entire world is a narrow bridge, but the main thing is not to fear."

Rabbi Michael M. Cohen is the director of special projects for the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies.