A Jewish Israeli Knesset member and former minister of defense, a senior Arab Israeli Knesset member and a top Palestinian politician from the occupied territories met last week in Tel Aviv. Sounds like the beginning of a joke, but this rare encounter took place on Aug. 22 in the lobby of Sokolov House, the headquarters of the Israeli Journalists Association. Former Defense Minister Amir Peretz of the Zionist Camp, Joint List Chair Ayman Odeh and senior Palestinian official Nabil Shaath shook hands over a simple wooden casket bearing the photo of journalist and former Knesset member Uri Avnery, who died two days earlier at the age of 94.

At the foot of the coffin lay a wreath from Yuli Edelstein, speaker of the Knesset. It's the same institution that recently adopted the nationality law discriminating between Israeli Jews and their Arab neighbors, the same parliament that has broken Israel’s record of racist legislation and is not nearly done. Even as the government was negotiating with Hamas, an organization preaching for the State of Israel’s annihilation, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas mourned his passage in a statement hailing his struggle against Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory that began in 1967 and his championing of an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel.

“I was moved to see that throughout the day, Palestinian television aired the condolence message sent by President Abbas,” said Odeh. “I want to see his name commemorated on a street in Ramallah,” he added, in a challenge directed at the Palestinian delegation from Ramallah. Let us start with Tel Aviv, I thought to myself. I looked around in vain for Ron Huldai, the mayor of the city that was home to Avnery and the campaigns he waged for peace. Perhaps President Reuven Rivlin, who praised Avnery’s campaign for official recognition of the pre-state Etzel underground militia, could cut the ribbon at the inauguration.

Avnery suffered a stroke as he was making his way to the Aug. 11 rally in Tel Aviv’s Rabin Square, where Arabs and Jews, lovers of peace and advocates of equality, Zionists and post-Zionists stood side by side demanding the repeal of the nationality law. When the protest ended, participants went their separate ways. Some to Herzliya, an affluent suburb north of Tel Aviv, others to the Israeli Arab town of Sakhnin. The next morning they were busy apologetically deflecting attacks by the political right and its affiliated media, which gleefully pounced on the hoisting of several Palestinian flags at the rally to de-legitimize the event.