Understanding human conflict requires us to understand human psychology. And it is only when we understand the psychology that drives conflict that we can take intelligent steps to address it.

Unfortunately, understanding the psychology of conflict is not easy and I would like to illustrate one significant problem in this regard and explain what we can do about it. That problem is what is often called 'projection' or 'transference' and it illustrates the importance of emotional, as distinct from intellectual, content in any conflict.

Let me start by quoting a few carefully selected words from a lengthy dialogue recently published. http://peacefromharmony.org/?cat=en_c&key=628 The dialogue took place between two Israelis, two Palestinians and several individuals from other countries and was focused on the Israeli occupation of Palestine. It was concluded by the moderator's observation that 'our discussion has reached an impasse'.

No, I’m not referring to the U.S. election. I’m referring to “Bycatch.” The name refers not to fish accidentally caught and killed while trying to catch and kill other fish, but to humans murdered in a game in which the player hopes to murder certain other humans but knows that he or she stands a good chance of murdering some bycatch.

The Nazis never reached this height of banality in the general German public, but had they done so it would be a sinister feature of tens of thousands of Hollywood movies. If Russians sat around playing a board game that involved blowing up Ukrainian children, the Washington Post would have already published several front-page articles.

This is a game that puts you in the shoes of one particular human being, thus far, but imagines several engaging in the same activity in competition. In Bycatch you become Barack Obama going through his Tuesday murder list. But Bycatch imagines as many nations as people playing the game, each engaging in a drone murder spree against the others. Here’s an excerpt from the rules:

“How to strike

Teen flick tackles Israel’s cultural divide

If politicians were replaced by filmmakers, the hostility between Arabs and Israelis would soon evaporate. That’s the impression you get after watching any number of imported flicks that treat people on both sides of the issue with respect and understanding.

Often the stories focus on a friendship or romance between a Jew and a Muslim. Sometimes, as in the case of A Borrowed Identity, they focus on both.

Eyad (Tawfeek Barhom) is the proud son of Salah (Ali Suliman), a Palestinian Israeli who was forced to drop out of college after being implicated in a long-ago bombing. Salah wants his brainy son to have the opportunity he lost and is elated when Eyad is accepted into a prestigious school in Jerusalem.

As one of the school’s few Arabs, Eyad at first feels isolated. It’s not long, however, before he’s made his first two Jewish friends: Naomi (Danielle Kitzis), a flirtatious young woman, and Yonatan (Michael Moshonov), a fellow student who has muscular dystrophy.

Three years after Ecuador’s government granted political asylum to Julian Assange in its small ground-floor London embassy, the founder of WikiLeaks is still there -- beyond the reach of the government whose vice president, Joe Biden, has labeled him “a digital terrorist." The Obama administration wants Assange in a U.S. prison, so that the only mouse he might ever see would be scurrying across the floor of a solitary-confinement cell.

Above and beyond Assange’s personal freedom, what’s at stake includes the impunity of the United States and its allies to relegate transparency to a mythical concept, with democracy more rhetoric than reality. From the Vietnam War era to today -- from aerial bombing and torture to ecological disasters and financial scams moving billions of dollars into private pockets -- the high-up secrecy hiding key realities from the public has done vast damage. No wonder economic and political elites despise WikiLeaks for its disclosures.

   The Ohio Secretary of State, Jon Husted, declared that the citizens of Medina, Fulton, and Athens Counties may not vote on their own county charter initiatives, despite meeting requirements to place those initiatives on the November ballot.
   In a statement released yesterday, Mr. Husted – elected by the citizens of Ohio – made clear that his interests lie with the oil and gas industry, rather than We the People. Despite the people’s constitutional right to alter or reform their own government, Mr. Husted claims “unfettered authority and being empowered by the Ohio Revised Code” to deny the people their constitutional right.
   This summer, Medina, Fulton, and Athens County residents secured the necessary signatures to place county charter initiatives on the November ballot. Each of these counties faces fracking wastewater injection wells, LNG pipelines, and other infrastructure projects that threaten to pollute clean air and pure water, regardless of community wishes.