They've never met, but share the common ground of family sorrow bigger than their opposing Mideast allegiances.

Idit Isaacsohn of Blue Ash with a portrait of her brother, Asaf, an Israeli soldier killed by a sniper. (Michael E. Keating photo) | ZOOM |

Bassam Ibrahim, a graduate student at Xavier, carried U.S. and Palestinian flags at a recent rally on Fountain Square. He lost an aunt and cousin in fighting. (Brandi Stafford photo) | ZOOM |

        Idit Isaacsohn, 41 of Blue Ash, grew up in Israel.

        Bassam Ibrahim, 37, of Norwood, grew up in Kuwait, of Palestinian roots.

        They had little in common until last month, when the bodies of Mr. Ibrahim's aunt and cousin were pulled from the rubble of what used to be their Nablus home in the West Bank. From Xavier University, where he's a grad student, he's one with his family's grief.

        Mrs. Isaacsohn, a research assistant in the microbiology department at the University of Cincinnati, has been there.

        “I understand his pain, for sure,” she said Monday, recalling how her brother, Asaf, 22, was killed in 1986 by a pro-Palestinian sniper.

        In Greater Cincinnati, people can distance themselves from the Mideast conflict with a flick of a remote, click of the mouse, or turn of the news page.

        Ms. Isaacsohn and Mr. Ibrahim cannot.

        While the deaths of a diabetic Palestinian grandmother and a scared Israeli soldier on patrol in Lebanon are very different, the impact on their families isn't.

        That's part of what drew both of these Cincinnati residents to a recent rally on Fountain Square, where they showed support for opposite sides in a conflict drowning in the bloodshed of centuries-old teachings and everyday fears of retaliation.

READING BUSINESS HAS STAKE IN MAKING PEACE

When Gary Heiman talks about the future of Palestinian-Israeli relations, he means business.     Literally.     “My whole philosophy is, the key to any region's survival is economic independence,” said Mr. Heiman, President and CEO of Reading-based Standard Textile.     His company, which is in the health-care industry, employs about 1,000 people in the Israel plant, 450 of whom are Palestinian. Mr. Heiman considers them “a good work force.”     He's Jewish, and lived in Israel from 1973 to 1987 and off and on for the next three years. Through business contacts, he's twice met with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.     “I believed two years ago, he wanted peace,” he said. “Today? No. While he told me that, he was preparing for war. ... I really feel bad for the Palestinian people. Since '67, Arafat has led them from one disaster to another.”     A former member of an Israeli army special forces unit, he called the deaths of Palestinian civilians “one of the dilemmas of the Israeli army.” But he said the murder of innocent Israelis by Palestinian suicide bombers reflects the cynical nature of Palestinian leadership.     “When you bring up an entire generation who are taught such hate,” Mr. Heiman said, “how do you move toward peace?”     From a territorial standpoint, he said, a short-term solution must involve building fences.     From a business standpoint, a long-term solution must involve building self-sufficiency through jobs.

        Both speak sympathetically of the deaths of innocent civilians. Both speak of peace in the ebbs and flows of shifting optimism.

        “You can't find the truth,” Mr. Ibrahim said of his relatives' deaths, during an interview at the International Students Center at Xavier University. “I'm here, and I'm just looking at the news, and I see so many horrible things,” said Mr. Ibrahim, who graduates in June with a master's degree in business administration.

        “Their blood is the same as ours,” Mrs. Isaacsohn said as she prepared tea in her kitchen.

        On Monday, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat began traveling again, his captivity lifted by the Israeli government. Tensions remained high. This month, a Palestinian suicide bomber killed 15 Israeli civilians when he blew himself up in a pool hall frequented by Jewish teen-agers.

        On the sidelines, thousands of miles away in Greater Cincinnati, are families who have lost loved ones.

        “Ten percent of both sides will pay the ultimate price, but the average Joe, you pay that price once, you realize it's not worth it,” Mrs. Isaacsohn said. “But there are fanatics on both sides.”

        The conflict intensified in 1948 when the state of Israel was established in the wake of World War II. But it goes back to Biblical times.

        This story isn't about who's right and wrong.

        It's about the price of Mideast violence paid by people whose connection is personal.

        For Mrs. Isaacsohn and Mr. Ibrahim, who live just 11 miles apart, their lives are here, their hearts are there.

        That's about to change. Mr. Ibrahim is going home to the Mideast, to his shattered family.

        “It's not a stigma, but it defines a family once it happens to them,” Mrs. Isaacsohn said. “It's not that you don't want to talk about it publicly, but it labels you somewhat.”

        Asaf was standing on the side of a road when he was shot in the neck. The bullet exited through his helmet.

        She looked down, then up, recalling an irony with a slight smile.

        “He believed in the rights of Palestinians. ... He wrote about the feeling of war, how scary it is. There are very few winners in war, except maybe sometimes politicians.”

        For years, she asked why.

        For Mr. Ibrahim, that question is a fresh wound.

        “Why? Why?,” he said, his voice choked with emotion. “My aunt and cousin didn't do anything, they were sitting at home. They couldn't do anything to stop the hurt of Israelis.”

        The incomplete story of what happened emerges from phone calls and e-mails.

        Half his family is in Jordan, including his mother and seven siblings, the other half calls the West Bank home. His parents fled Palestine before he was born.

        His aunt, Karima Al-Tiraui, lived in the Valta camp in the West Bank. His cousin, Kamalat Al-Tiraui, 32, was the mother of four small children.

        “It's just the thing that I won't see them, and the way they were killed,” he said. “Sitting in your home, you think you're safe. We're not sure if Israeli tanks fired on them or they were bulldozed.”

        When his uncle learned of their deaths, he suffered a fatal heart attack.

        “I know that both sides have suffered,” Mr. Ibrahim said. “There should be some solution for the whole thing, but how to get to that solution, I have no idea.”

        Mr. Ibrahim, who's been in Cincinnati five years, graduated in 1983 from a Kuwaiti public high school that had no Jews. His neighborhood had Egyptians, Lebanese and Indians, who he said co-existed well.

        He graduated from Irbid University in Kuwait with a degree in accounting.

        Mrs. Isaacsohn also is from a family of high achievers. She was raised in a small kibbutz outside Tel Aviv, and “the West Bank was 500 meters away,” she said.

        When his relatives were killed, Mr. Ibrahim began plans to go back to the Mideast, despite an offer to stay another year in a student-work program through Xavier.

        One married sister lived in Montgomery, then Price Hill, but moved back to Jordan in the aftermath of Sept. 11. She wears traditional Muslim clothes, and was concerned about retribution to the point she was afraid to leave the house.

        Two of her three children are American-born.

        Mr. Ibrahim said he's faced no anti-Muslim comments since the terrorist attacks in New York City, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania, and counts Jews among his friends.

        Mrs. Isaacsohn and her physician husband are raising their three kids in Cincinnati. They're ages 16, 13 and 11.

        Mrs. Isaacsohn has been in America 20 years, having previously lived in Boston and New Haven, Conn.

        They were living in the Boston suburb of Brookline in 1986 when they learned her brother had been killed. She was 23.

        “And then life begins,” she said.

        Mr. Ibrahim now knows that sense of helplessness, but also the sense of duty that fuels Palestinian violence.

        “It's from our culture, you have to take revenge,” he said. “If an Arab killed my family, I would take revenge, or people will look at me with shame.”

        That cycle repeated itself with his relatives' deaths, and the horrific suicide-bombing that followed, and for which the Islamic militant group Hamas claimed responsibility.

        Mrs. Isaacsohn remains hopeful for peace, Mr. Ibrahim less so.

        Meanwhile, their hearts shift from the Mideast to Midwest, knowing the list of victims continues to grow.

Allegiances divisive, even far from Mideast
Vote on ordaining gays has nationwide implications
Boats sink, 2 men missing
Former Democratic chairman testifies at Conese fund trial
Mega Millions game gets go-ahead
Teen effort to salute soldier may be model
West Chester looks at services for growing group
Some Good News
PULFER: Law lagging
RADEL: Welcome mat?
Bus firm wants to ride on tax
Local team returns to TV
Airport suspect talkative in court
Jealousy may be why woman slain, police say
Prosecutors look over files
Smokers, businesses may be hit up
Walk will raise funds for hospital
City schools keep panel to advise on work contracts
Consultant to continue work in Mason
Lakota district hires principal for new elementary school
Man accused of spraying toxin on trooper
Private colleges see enrollment tightening
Tristate A.M. Report
Judge rejects no-sex condition for deadbeat dad
Ky. expects to see economic benefit
Louisville Archdiocese sees 11 more suits filed
Principal aims for state honor
Kentucky A.M. Report