Proffy's adventure

**Jerusalem, 1947.** You are a 12-year old Jewish boy named Proffy, adventurous and quick-witted. Your biggest dream is to be a spy, helping your country (Israel) win the war against Britain and the Arabs. Jerusalem currently has a strict curfew on both Jews and Arabs, but you are busy in a secret meeting with your friends and do not notice that night is about to fall. When night falls, you are alarmed because you know soldiers patrol the streets and you will get caught. [[Run home]] [[Stay in the cave]]

You run back home as quickly as possible. Suddenly, you feel a firm hand on your shoulder which stops you in your tracks. It is a plucky British soldier. He says he will take you home himself and tell your parents to punish you. Oh no! Your father will be very cross and not let you leave the house for at least a week. [[Tell him your address]] [[Tell him a fake address]]

You and your friends decide to spend the night in the cave. Finally a real adventure! First though, you creep outside of the cave to check if it is a safe space to spend the night. As soon as you're outisde, you feel a sudden, firm hand on your shoulder which stops you in your tracks. It is a plucky British soldier. He says he will take you home himself and tell your parents to punish you. Oh no! Your father will be very cross and not let you leave the house for at least a week. [[Tell him your address]] [[Tell him a fake address]]

The soldier brings you home. He does not punish you, but your father is ballistic: he says that you could have gotten killed out there alone after dark. He tells you that, in the city of Haifa, some Jewish children were abducted and tortured by Arabs. [[Sounds scary]] [[Sounds like fake news. Where are your sources dad??]]

You are walking along with the soldier bruskly holding your arm. You are directing him to a made-up address you came up with. You can either [[Keep walking]] [[Tell him the truth]]

You keep walking until the soldier realises you were lying all along. He takes you to the military barracks instead. He also shows you the military detention center. There are many Arabs held there as prisoners; the solider explains that you will end up like the terrible Arabs if you do not clean up your behaviour. [[You promise to behave better and ask to be taken home]] [[You say you also hate Arabs]]

You confess that the address was made up. Surprisingly, the soldier is not mad but instead says he will let you off without punishment. First, he asks if you can teach him some Hebrew, seeing as his native language is English but he is keen to learn. [[Omg perv]] [[Sure]]

Your sense of distrust of the British grows after this encounter. You are so weirded out by this old-ass soldier that you end up hating the British. You instead begin to fraternise with your Arab peers. Congratulations! You managed to put hate for British colonialism above your hate for your neighbours. Hopefully Jews and Arabs will cohabit happily thanks to people like you spreading your message of freedom.

You begin meeting with the British soldier every afternoon at a nearby café. He slowly picks up Hebrew even though his accent is still ridiculously British. The soldier convinces you that the British are not the enemy: they are only trying to protect you from the evil Arabs who want to take over and destroy your Promised Land. [[Seems legit]] [[Hang on a minute..]]

You fear what your father will say, but at least the soldier won't arrest you or take you away. Maybe these British guys aren't so bad after all.. maybe they're here to protect us from the real enemy, the Arabs.. [[Tell him your address]]

To be fair, all you've ever heard from people around you is that Arabs abduct children and ride camels. It must all be true. [[Seems legit]]

You have let wartime nationalism get to you. You begin to think that Arabs don't have the right to inhabit your same land, because Jews were there first. You grow up thinking that Jews like you deserve more privileges than Arabs because your Holy Book says so. Better luck next time! You're a racist.

You begin to question why the soldier is putting so much emphasis on making Arabs into the enemy. You realise that the ongoing war is distoring people's ideas of each other, and that the British only want to keep encourage wartime nationalism and internal conflict for their own political gain. You are proud to be Jewish, but also do not want to demonise Arabs. You begin to discuss peace with Arabs among your friends, until they are also convinced. Congratulations! Your attitude will jumpstart peaceful dialogue and hopefully make Israel and a better place.

Does that mean I should avoid all Arabs?? Or maybe it's just an unfortunate episode that happened because we are currently in the middle of a bloody civil war and we are being made to hate each other by the British? [[I'm sure not all Arabs are bad]] [[Must. Avoid. All. Arabs.]]

Now **that** is the kind of inquisite attitude that will lead you to think with your own mind and not hate people for no reason. Always believe the best of people (until proven otherwise) and ignore stereotypes. Congratulations! You'll probably turn into a smart guy and **not** an ignorant, Arab-hating bigot. As a reward, here is the legally shady full movie on YouTube. Definitely worth watching! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ojArUD9gJs&t=1210s

You have let wartime nationalism get to you. You begin to think that Arabs don't have the right to inhabit your same land, because Jews were there first. You grow up thinking that Jews like you deserve more priviledges than Arabs because your Holy Book says so. Better luck next time! You're a racist.

How much do you know about the Israeli-Palestine conflict? What side would you have been on if you had been a kid when the conflict broke out? Would //you// have become a nationalist fanatic? Find out with this interactive story, loosely based on "Panther in the Basement" by Amos Oz. [[Start]]