The anti-Israel boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign � BDS � wants to prevent Jews and Muslims from working together.
Should this campaign prevail, cross-border projects in the Middle East, like the one just announced in Jordan that promises to advance cancer research, archaeological studies and efforts to protect agriculture from diseases, would be forced to cease and desist.
Nicknamed �Sesame,� an acrostic for Synchrotron-light for Experimental Science and Applications in the Middle East, the project centers upon a new research center near Amman that hosts a particle accelerator (synchrotron) that functions like a powerful microscope. The synchrotron has wide application, thanks to its ability to render views of extraordinary detail.
Sesame is jointed operated by scientists and researchers from countries throughout the region, including Israel and Iran. Palestinians also benefit from having access to the facility and its equipment.
By calling the project Sesame � a play on the phrase, �Open Sesame� � organizers aim to usher in a new era of collaborative science, while helping to stem the flow of brain drain in the region, according to reports. The project is some 20 years in the making. In 2012, Egypt, Israel, Iran and Jordan each pledged $5 million to help fund its construction.
Besides enabling Israelis and Iranians, and Israelis and Palestinians, to share a workspace, the project brings together other countries without diplomatic relations between them, such as Turkey and Cyprus, under the same roof.
Sesame is home to the Middle East�s first synchrotron. It�s poised to become the first lab of its kind in the world to be powered by renewable energy.
�People and scientists from all over the region, as well as many parts of the world, have demonstrated that one can work together over decades for a common goal, benefitting humanity,� said Dr. Eliezer Rabinovici, an Israeli physicist who championed the project.
�Today, a tiny lighthouse is opened, which can suggest another direction to the young generation,� he said at the facility�s opening ceremony.
In other words, a project like Sesame opens the door to future opportunities in the Middle East for cross-border collaboration. These opportunities, in turn, lay the foundation for peaceful coexistence in the region.
This new reality is predicated on people�s willingness and ability to work together. Propaganda campaigns, like BDS, seek to prevent peaceful coexistence in the Middle East.
