We, Americans who believe that only through peace could Israel achieve true security, are grieving the victims of this war and of the hostilities that preceded it, on both sides of the Israel-Gaza border.

A year after the war, the humanitarian tragedy inside the Gaza Strip that preceded the war, continues unabated. A year after Operation Cast Lead, renewed rocket fire from the Gaza Strip threatens to ignite another war.

A year after the war, we continue to urge the US administration and the government of Israel, as well as Hamas, to pursue a diplomatically-negotiated sustainable political arrangement for Gaza, which would provide security and normalcy to the population of southern Israel and to the residents of the Gaza Strip, and which will allow the people of Gaza to rebuild.

Only this way will the next war be averted.