Read Writing in the Dark Online
Authors: David Grossman
Writing in the Dark (12 page)
Could real peace begin the Israeli-Jewish process of healing from those distresses and anomalies?
Moreover, will “the world”—namely, the Christian and Muslim worlds, as well as regions dominated by other faiths and religions, and states where anti-Semitism prevails, whether openly or as an undercurrent—be able to heal itself of its distorted approach to Israel and to Judaism?
Will it ever be able to let go of its racism toward Jews?
With your permission, I will leave these momentous questions open.
I do not have the answers.
Moreover, will “the world”—namely, the Christian and Muslim worlds, as well as regions dominated by other faiths and religions, and states where anti-Semitism prevails, whether openly or as an undercurrent—be able to heal itself of its distorted approach to Israel and to Judaism?
Will it ever be able to let go of its racism toward Jews?
With your permission, I will leave these momentous questions open.
I do not have the answers.
There is one more unanswered question: What will really happen to Israeli society, now polarized and conflict-ridden, if the external threat is removed—the threat that currently protects it from internal strife and “helps” it avoid confronting the contentious issues?
To an outside observer this may seem an unfounded and even fantastical question, but it has been hovering in Israeli public space for decades, so much so that one can sometimes hear statements along the lines of “The war with the Arabs saves us from civil war.”
To an outside observer this may seem an unfounded and even fantastical question, but it has been hovering in Israeli public space for decades, so much so that one can sometimes hear statements along the lines of “The war with the Arabs saves us from civil war.”
I have no doubt that removing the external threat from Israel will clear a large space for it to cope with its profound domestic troubles.
Although the crux of the central argument between “right” and “left,” on the question of the Occupation, will be dulled, other issues will jump to the forefront: the vast social and economic gaps, the tense relations between secular and religious
Jews, between Jews and Arabs, and between different immigrant groups who are unable and unwilling to understand one another.
Such circumstances may expose the fragility of the diverse and diffuse immigrant society that has emerged in Israel.
They may also reveal the weakness of the democratic worldview, which does not seem to have been truly internalized by most citizens, both because they came to Israel from countries that never knew democracy and because it is impossible for a state to maintain true democracy while simultaneously upholding a regime of occupation and oppression.
Although the crux of the central argument between “right” and “left,” on the question of the Occupation, will be dulled, other issues will jump to the forefront: the vast social and economic gaps, the tense relations between secular and religious
Jews, between Jews and Arabs, and between different immigrant groups who are unable and unwilling to understand one another.
Such circumstances may expose the fragility of the diverse and diffuse immigrant society that has emerged in Israel.
They may also reveal the weakness of the democratic worldview, which does not seem to have been truly internalized by most citizens, both because they came to Israel from countries that never knew democracy and because it is impossible for a state to maintain true democracy while simultaneously upholding a regime of occupation and oppression.
Still, only a madman or a complete cynic would prefer Israel’s century-old state of war to a state of peace, bad as it may be.
Even if internal conflicts do erupt, even if genies are let out of their bottles, they will be
our
genies, the internal, authentic identity materials of the State of Israel and Israeli society.
In some sense, the developments that occur then, though they may be painful, will be far more relevant to the construction of Israeli identity than the processes in which Israel has found itself due to the conflict with the Arabs.
The fact that such hesitations are openly voiced and contemplated by many Israelis attests to the powerful destruction and degeneration that can result from prolonged exposure to the cancerous rays of war.
Even if internal conflicts do erupt, even if genies are let out of their bottles, they will be
our
genies, the internal, authentic identity materials of the State of Israel and Israeli society.
In some sense, the developments that occur then, though they may be painful, will be far more relevant to the construction of Israeli identity than the processes in which Israel has found itself due to the conflict with the Arabs.
The fact that such hesitations are openly voiced and contemplated by many Israelis attests to the powerful destruction and degeneration that can result from prolonged exposure to the cancerous rays of war.
“Here in the land our ancestors cherished, all our hopes will come true,” our pioneering forefathers sang when
they came to
Eretz Yisrael
roughly a century ago.
Today it is clear that many years will pass before even a fraction of “all our hopes” comes true.
It will be very difficult to relinquish the distortions of violence and anxiety, as it is sometimes difficult for a slave to lose his shackles or for someone to let go of a defect around which his entire personality has been constructed.
they came to
Eretz Yisrael
roughly a century ago.
Today it is clear that many years will pass before even a fraction of “all our hopes” comes true.
It will be very difficult to relinquish the distortions of violence and anxiety, as it is sometimes difficult for a slave to lose his shackles or for someone to let go of a defect around which his entire personality has been constructed.
Because the situation we live in, in Israel, in Palestine, in the Middle East, has become a sort of national and personal defect.
Many of us have become so used to the deformation that we find it difficult to even believe in any other existence.
Others create entire ideologies, political and religious, to
ensure
the continuation of the present situation.
Many of us have become so used to the deformation that we find it difficult to even believe in any other existence.
Others create entire ideologies, political and religious, to
ensure
the continuation of the present situation.
Hegel said that history is made by evil people.
In the Middle East, I think we know that the opposite is also true: we have seen how a certain history can make people evil.
We know that prolonged existence in a state of hostility, which leads us to act more stringently, more suspiciously, in a crueler and more “military” manner, slowly kills something within our souls and finally hardens like an internal mask of death over our consciousness, our volition, our language, and our simple, natural happiness.
In the Middle East, I think we know that the opposite is also true: we have seen how a certain history can make people evil.
We know that prolonged existence in a state of hostility, which leads us to act more stringently, more suspiciously, in a crueler and more “military” manner, slowly kills something within our souls and finally hardens like an internal mask of death over our consciousness, our volition, our language, and our simple, natural happiness.
These are the real dangers that Israel must act quickly to avoid.
Israel needs to experience a life of peace, not only because peace is essential for its security and economy, but so that it can, in a sense,
get to know itself.
So that it can discover everything that is still present,
though dormant, in its being: the parts of its identity and personality, and the possibilities of existence, that have been suspended until the anger dies down, until the war ends, until it can be allowed to live life to the fullest in all its dimensions, not only the narrow dimension of survival at any cost.
Israel needs to experience a life of peace, not only because peace is essential for its security and economy, but so that it can, in a sense,
get to know itself.
So that it can discover everything that is still present,
though dormant, in its being: the parts of its identity and personality, and the possibilities of existence, that have been suspended until the anger dies down, until the war ends, until it can be allowed to live life to the fullest in all its dimensions, not only the narrow dimension of survival at any cost.
Elias Canetti writes in one of his essays that survival is in fact a repeated experience of death.
A sort of practice of death and of the fear of death.
At times I feel that a nation of sworn survivors like the Jewish people is a nation that somehow addresses death at least as insistently as it addresses life, a nation whose intimate and permanent interlocutor is death, no less than life itself.
And I do not mean to imply a romanticization or idealization of death, or even the idea of being in love with death (akin to the prevailing notions in late-nineteenth-century Germany, for example).
Rather, I am speaking of something more profound.
Of some firsthand knowledge, a bitter knowledge that is passed through the umbilical cord, a knowledge of the concreteness and the actuality and the daily availability of death.
A knowledge of the “unbearable lightness of death,” whose saddest expression I ever heard was in an interview with an Israeli couple on the eve of their marriage.
They were asked how many children they would like to have, and the sweet young bride immediately answered that they wanted three children, “so that if one is killed, we will still have two.”
A sort of practice of death and of the fear of death.
At times I feel that a nation of sworn survivors like the Jewish people is a nation that somehow addresses death at least as insistently as it addresses life, a nation whose intimate and permanent interlocutor is death, no less than life itself.
And I do not mean to imply a romanticization or idealization of death, or even the idea of being in love with death (akin to the prevailing notions in late-nineteenth-century Germany, for example).
Rather, I am speaking of something more profound.
Of some firsthand knowledge, a bitter knowledge that is passed through the umbilical cord, a knowledge of the concreteness and the actuality and the daily availability of death.
A knowledge of the “unbearable lightness of death,” whose saddest expression I ever heard was in an interview with an Israeli couple on the eve of their marriage.
They were asked how many children they would like to have, and the sweet young bride immediately answered that they wanted three children, “so that if one is killed, we will still have two.”
When I hear Israelis, even very young ones, talk about themselves and about their fears, about not daring
to hope for a better future, when I am exposed—in those close to me, and in myself—to the powerful existential anxiety and the influence of the tragic historical Jewish memory, I can often feel, chillingly, the failing left in us by history, the terrible tendency to view life as latent death.
to hope for a better future, when I am exposed—in those close to me, and in myself—to the powerful existential anxiety and the influence of the tragic historical Jewish memory, I can often feel, chillingly, the failing left in us by history, the terrible tendency to view life as latent death.
In a life of stable and continued peace, this failing and these anxieties may find some cure.
If Israel can live in peace with its neighbors, it will have the opportunity to express all of its abilities and all of its uniqueness.
To examine, under normal conditions, what it is capable of as a nation and as a society.
To discover whether it is able to forge a spiritual and material reality full of life, creation, inspiration, and humanity.
To examine whether its Jewish citizens can extricate themselves from the destructive fatal metaphor framed for them by other nations, who have viewed them as eternal strangers, as borderless nomads among nations—to step out of these definitions and become a nation “of flesh and blood.” Not just a symbol or an abstract concept, not a parable or a stereotype, not an ideal or a demon.
A nation in its country, a nation whose state is surrounded by internationally recognized and defensible borders.
A nation that enjoys not only a sense of security and continuity but also a rare experience of
actuality
, of being, finally, “part of life” and not “larger than life.” Perhaps then Israelis will be able to taste what even after fifty-six years of independence they do not truly know—a deep internal sense of security, of “solid existence,” like the one expressed so
simply and movingly in the
musaf
prayer recited on the Sabbath: “And plant us in our borders.”
If Israel can live in peace with its neighbors, it will have the opportunity to express all of its abilities and all of its uniqueness.
To examine, under normal conditions, what it is capable of as a nation and as a society.
To discover whether it is able to forge a spiritual and material reality full of life, creation, inspiration, and humanity.
To examine whether its Jewish citizens can extricate themselves from the destructive fatal metaphor framed for them by other nations, who have viewed them as eternal strangers, as borderless nomads among nations—to step out of these definitions and become a nation “of flesh and blood.” Not just a symbol or an abstract concept, not a parable or a stereotype, not an ideal or a demon.
A nation in its country, a nation whose state is surrounded by internationally recognized and defensible borders.
A nation that enjoys not only a sense of security and continuity but also a rare experience of
actuality
, of being, finally, “part of life” and not “larger than life.” Perhaps then Israelis will be able to taste what even after fifty-six years of independence they do not truly know—a deep internal sense of security, of “solid existence,” like the one expressed so
simply and movingly in the
musaf
prayer recited on the Sabbath: “And plant us in our borders.”
I conclude with one more wish, which I once expressed in my novel
See Under: Love.
This wish is uttered at the very end of the book, when a group of persecuted Jews in the Warsaw ghetto finds an abandoned baby boy and decides to raise him.
These elderly Jews, broken and tortured, stand around the child and dream about what they would like his life to be, and into what sort of a world they would like him to grow up.
Behind them, the real world is going up in smoke, with blood and fire everywhere, and they say a prayer together.
This is their prayer: “All of us prayed for one thing: that he might end his life knowing nothing of war … We asked so little: for a man to live in this world from birth to death and know nothing of war.”
See Under: Love.
This wish is uttered at the very end of the book, when a group of persecuted Jews in the Warsaw ghetto finds an abandoned baby boy and decides to raise him.
These elderly Jews, broken and tortured, stand around the child and dream about what they would like his life to be, and into what sort of a world they would like him to grow up.
Behind them, the real world is going up in smoke, with blood and fire everywhere, and they say a prayer together.
This is their prayer: “All of us prayed for one thing: that he might end his life knowing nothing of war … We asked so little: for a man to live in this world from birth to death and know nothing of war.”
Lecture at the Levinas Circle meeting in Paris, December 5, 2004
The annual memorial ceremony for Yitzhak Rabin is the moment when we pause to remember Rabin the man and Rabin the leader.
We also look at ourselves, at Israeli society, at its leadership, the national mood, the status of the peace process, and at our own place as private individuals within the national developments.
It is not easy to look at ourselves this year.
We also look at ourselves, at Israeli society, at its leadership, the national mood, the status of the peace process, and at our own place as private individuals within the national developments.
It is not easy to look at ourselves this year.
There was a war.
Israel flexed its huge military muscle, revealing nothing but its powerlessness and fragility.
We discovered that, ultimately, our military might alone cannot ensure our existence.
Moreover, we discovered that Israel is in a profound crisis, far more profound than we had imagined, in almost every aspect of its being.
Israel flexed its huge military muscle, revealing nothing but its powerlessness and fragility.
We discovered that, ultimately, our military might alone cannot ensure our existence.
Moreover, we discovered that Israel is in a profound crisis, far more profound than we had imagined, in almost every aspect of its being.
I am speaking to you this evening as someone whose love for this country is difficult and complicated, but nonetheless unequivocal.
And as someone whose long-standing covenant with the country has become, tragically, a covenant of blood.
I am a wholly secular man, yet
to me the establishment and the very existence of the State of Israel are a sort of miracle that we as a people have experienced—a political, national, human miracle.
I do not forget this even for a moment.
Even when many things in the reality of our lives outrage and depress me, even as the miracle is broken down into tiny units of routine and misery, of corruption and cynicism, even when reality seems like a bad parody of the miracle, I always remember.
And it is from this feeling that I speak to you tonight.
And as someone whose long-standing covenant with the country has become, tragically, a covenant of blood.
I am a wholly secular man, yet
to me the establishment and the very existence of the State of Israel are a sort of miracle that we as a people have experienced—a political, national, human miracle.
I do not forget this even for a moment.
Even when many things in the reality of our lives outrage and depress me, even as the miracle is broken down into tiny units of routine and misery, of corruption and cynicism, even when reality seems like a bad parody of the miracle, I always remember.
And it is from this feeling that I speak to you tonight.
“Behold, earth, for we have been very wasteful,” wrote the poet Shaul Tchernichovsky in 1938.
He was lamenting the fact that in the earth of Israel, time after time, we bury young people in the prime of their lives.
He was lamenting the fact that in the earth of Israel, time after time, we bury young people in the prime of their lives.
The death of a young person is a terrible, shattering waste.
But no less terrible is the sense that for many years the State of Israel has been criminally wasting not only the lives of its children, but also the miracle it experienced—the great and rare chance bestowed upon it by history, the chance to create an enlightened, decent, democratic state that would conduct itself according to Jewish and universal values.
A state that would be a national home and a refuge, but not
only
a refuge: rather, a place that would also give new meaning to Jewish existence.
An essential part of the Jewish identity of this state, of its Jewish ethos, was to be a thoroughly egalitarian and respectful attitude toward its non-Jewish citizens.
But no less terrible is the sense that for many years the State of Israel has been criminally wasting not only the lives of its children, but also the miracle it experienced—the great and rare chance bestowed upon it by history, the chance to create an enlightened, decent, democratic state that would conduct itself according to Jewish and universal values.
A state that would be a national home and a refuge, but not
only
a refuge: rather, a place that would also give new meaning to Jewish existence.
An essential part of the Jewish identity of this state, of its Jewish ethos, was to be a thoroughly egalitarian and respectful attitude toward its non-Jewish citizens.
And look what has happened.
Look what has happened to the young, daring, enthusiastic, and soulful country that used to be here.
See how, through some accelerated aging process, Israel has leaped from infancy, through childhood and adolescence, to a permanent state of discontent, weakness, and missed opportunities.
How did this happen?
When did we lose even the hope that we could ever live a different life, a better life?
Moreover, how can we continue to stand by and watch, as if hypnotized, as our home is taken over by madness and coarseness, violence and racism?
See how, through some accelerated aging process, Israel has leaped from infancy, through childhood and adolescence, to a permanent state of discontent, weakness, and missed opportunities.
How did this happen?
When did we lose even the hope that we could ever live a different life, a better life?
Moreover, how can we continue to stand by and watch, as if hypnotized, as our home is taken over by madness and coarseness, violence and racism?
And how, I ask you, is it possible that a nation with our powers of creativity and renewal, a nation that has managed to resurrect itself from the ashes time after time, finds itself today—precisely when it has such huge military power—flaccid and helpless?
A victim once again—but this time, a victim of itself, of its own anxieties and despair, of its own nearsightedness?
A victim once again—but this time, a victim of itself, of its own anxieties and despair, of its own nearsightedness?
One of the harshest outcomes of the recent war is our heightened sense that there is no king in Israel.
That our leadership is hollow.
Both the political and the military leadership.
I am not speaking of the obvious failures in the way the war was conducted, nor of the neglect of the home front.
Nor of the corruption, small and large.
I am speaking of the fact that the people who are leading Israel today are incapable of connecting Israelis with their identity—certainly not a healthy, animating, nurturing identity, one comprising the foundations, the memories, and the values that could give Israelis strength and hope.
Such an identity would be an antidote to the waning of mutual responsibility and attachment to the country; it would give meaning to the exhausting and dispiriting struggle for existence.
That our leadership is hollow.
Both the political and the military leadership.
I am not speaking of the obvious failures in the way the war was conducted, nor of the neglect of the home front.
Nor of the corruption, small and large.
I am speaking of the fact that the people who are leading Israel today are incapable of connecting Israelis with their identity—certainly not a healthy, animating, nurturing identity, one comprising the foundations, the memories, and the values that could give Israelis strength and hope.
Such an identity would be an antidote to the waning of mutual responsibility and attachment to the country; it would give meaning to the exhausting and dispiriting struggle for existence.
The main substances with which Israeli leadership fills the shell of its rule today are primarily those of fear, on the one hand, and intimidation, on the other.
The enchantment of power, the wink of the quick fix.
Wheeling and dealing in all we hold dear.
In this respect, they are not true leaders, and they cannot help a nation adrift in such a complicated state of affairs.
Sometimes it seems as though the echoes of our leaders’ thoughts, of their historical memory, of their vision, of the things they truly care about, exist solely in the tiny space between two newspaper headlines.
Or between two investigations by the attorney general.
The enchantment of power, the wink of the quick fix.
Wheeling and dealing in all we hold dear.
In this respect, they are not true leaders, and they cannot help a nation adrift in such a complicated state of affairs.
Sometimes it seems as though the echoes of our leaders’ thoughts, of their historical memory, of their vision, of the things they truly care about, exist solely in the tiny space between two newspaper headlines.
Or between two investigations by the attorney general.
Look at the people who are leading us.
Not all of them, of course, but too many of them.
Look at the scared, suspicious, sweaty ways they behave, at their prosecutorial, deceptive conduct.
It is ridiculous even to hope that they might be the source of any inspiration, any vision, even so much as an original idea, something truly creative, daring, imaginative.
When was the last time the prime minister conceived or implemented a move that had the power to open a single new horizon for Israelis?
A better future?
When did he initiate a social, cultural, or moral measure, rather than frenetically react to the measures imposed on him by others?
Not all of them, of course, but too many of them.
Look at the scared, suspicious, sweaty ways they behave, at their prosecutorial, deceptive conduct.
It is ridiculous even to hope that they might be the source of any inspiration, any vision, even so much as an original idea, something truly creative, daring, imaginative.
When was the last time the prime minister conceived or implemented a move that had the power to open a single new horizon for Israelis?
A better future?
When did he initiate a social, cultural, or moral measure, rather than frenetically react to the measures imposed on him by others?
Mr.
Prime Minister, I am not saying these things out
of anger or vengefulness.
I have waited long enough so that I would not be responding out of any fleeting impulse.
You cannot dismiss my words tonight by saying that a man should not be judged at his time of grief.
Of course I am in grief.
But more than anger, what I feel is pain.
I am pained by this country, and by what you and your friends are doing to it.
Believe me, your success is important to me, because the future of us all depends on your ability to stand up and do something.
Prime Minister, I am not saying these things out
of anger or vengefulness.
I have waited long enough so that I would not be responding out of any fleeting impulse.
You cannot dismiss my words tonight by saying that a man should not be judged at his time of grief.
Of course I am in grief.
But more than anger, what I feel is pain.
I am pained by this country, and by what you and your friends are doing to it.
Believe me, your success is important to me, because the future of us all depends on your ability to stand up and do something.
Yitzhak Rabin turned to the path of peace with the Palestinians not because he felt any great affection for them or their leader.
Then too, as we recall, the general opinion was that we had no partner among the Palestinians, and that there was nothing to talk about.
Rabin decided to do something because he observed, wisely, that Israeli society could not continue to exist for very long in a state of unresolved conflict.
He understood before many others did that life in a constant climate of violence, occupation, terror, anxiety, and hopelessness was taking a toll that Israel could not withstand.
These things are still true today, even more sharply so.
In a moment we shall talk about the partner we do or do not have.
First, let us look at ourselves.
Then too, as we recall, the general opinion was that we had no partner among the Palestinians, and that there was nothing to talk about.
Rabin decided to do something because he observed, wisely, that Israeli society could not continue to exist for very long in a state of unresolved conflict.
He understood before many others did that life in a constant climate of violence, occupation, terror, anxiety, and hopelessness was taking a toll that Israel could not withstand.
These things are still true today, even more sharply so.
In a moment we shall talk about the partner we do or do not have.
First, let us look at ourselves.
For more than a century we have been living in strife.
We, the citizens of this conflict, were born into war, schooled in it, and in some ways programmed for it.
Perhaps this is why we sometimes think that this madness in which we have been living for over a hundred years is the real thing, the only thing, the only life we were
meant to live, and that we do not have the option, or even the
right
, to aspire to another life: we shall live by the sword and we shall die by the sword, and the sword shall devour forever.
We, the citizens of this conflict, were born into war, schooled in it, and in some ways programmed for it.
Perhaps this is why we sometimes think that this madness in which we have been living for over a hundred years is the real thing, the only thing, the only life we were
meant to live, and that we do not have the option, or even the
right
, to aspire to another life: we shall live by the sword and we shall die by the sword, and the sword shall devour forever.
Perhaps this explains the indifference with which we accept the total failure of the peace process, a failure that has been going on for years, demanding more and more victims.
This may also explain the general lack of response to the heavy blow against democracy dealt by the appointment of Avigdor Lieberman as a senior minister—the appointment of a known pyromaniac to run the national fire brigade.
These are also some of the factors that have contributed to Israel’s remarkably rapid decline into coldness and real cruelty toward the weak, the poor, and the suffering.
An indifference to the fate of the hungry, the elderly, the sick, and the handicapped; a national apathy toward the trade in women, for instance, or the exploitation and slave conditions of foreign workers; a deep-seated, institutionalized racism toward the Arab minority.
When all these can occur here so naturally, arousing neither shock nor protest, I begin to fear that even if peace comes tomorrow, even if we ever return to some sort of normality, it may already be too late for a full recovery.
This may also explain the general lack of response to the heavy blow against democracy dealt by the appointment of Avigdor Lieberman as a senior minister—the appointment of a known pyromaniac to run the national fire brigade.
These are also some of the factors that have contributed to Israel’s remarkably rapid decline into coldness and real cruelty toward the weak, the poor, and the suffering.
An indifference to the fate of the hungry, the elderly, the sick, and the handicapped; a national apathy toward the trade in women, for instance, or the exploitation and slave conditions of foreign workers; a deep-seated, institutionalized racism toward the Arab minority.
When all these can occur here so naturally, arousing neither shock nor protest, I begin to fear that even if peace comes tomorrow, even if we ever return to some sort of normality, it may already be too late for a full recovery.
The tragedy that befell my family and me upon the death of our son Uri does not give me special privileges in the public discourse.
But I believe that facing death and loss
brings a kind of sobriety, a clarity, or at least an enhanced capacity to distinguish between primary and secondary.
Between what can be obtained and what cannot.
Between reality and fantasy.
But I believe that facing death and loss
brings a kind of sobriety, a clarity, or at least an enhanced capacity to distinguish between primary and secondary.
Between what can be obtained and what cannot.
Between reality and fantasy.
Any intelligent person in Israel—and, I will add, in Palestine—knows today exactly where the lines of any possible resolution to the conflict between the two peoples lie.
Any intelligent person, on our side or theirs, knows deep in his heart the difference between dreams and heartfelt desires, and what may be obtained at the end of negotiations.
Whoever does not know this is already not a partner for dialogue, whether Jewish or Arab, because he is trapped in his hermetic fanaticism.
Any intelligent person, on our side or theirs, knows deep in his heart the difference between dreams and heartfelt desires, and what may be obtained at the end of negotiations.
Whoever does not know this is already not a partner for dialogue, whether Jewish or Arab, because he is trapped in his hermetic fanaticism.
Let us look for a moment at those who are supposed to be our partners.
The Palestinians have chosen Hamas to lead them, and Hamas refuses to negotiate with us or even recognize us.
What can be done in this situation?
What other steps can we take?
Should we keep smothering them?
Keep killing hundreds of Palestinians in Gaza, the vast majority of whom are innocent civilians like ourselves?
The Palestinians have chosen Hamas to lead them, and Hamas refuses to negotiate with us or even recognize us.
What can be done in this situation?
What other steps can we take?
Should we keep smothering them?
Keep killing hundreds of Palestinians in Gaza, the vast majority of whom are innocent civilians like ourselves?
Go to the Palestinians, Mr.
Olmert.
Go to them over the head of Hamas.
Go to the moderates among them, the ones who, like me and you, oppose Hamas and its ways.
Go to the Palestinian people.
Speak to their deep wounds, recognize their continued suffering.
Your status will not be diminished, nor will that of Israel in any future negotiations.
But people’s hearts will begin to open a little to one another, and this opening has huge power.
Simple human compassion is as strong as a force of nature, particularly in a state of stagnation and hostility.
Olmert.
Go to them over the head of Hamas.
Go to the moderates among them, the ones who, like me and you, oppose Hamas and its ways.
Go to the Palestinian people.
Speak to their deep wounds, recognize their continued suffering.
Your status will not be diminished, nor will that of Israel in any future negotiations.
But people’s hearts will begin to open a little to one another, and this opening has huge power.
Simple human compassion is as strong as a force of nature, particularly in a state of stagnation and hostility.
For once, look at them not only through the crosshairs of a rifle or a roadblock.
You will see a nation no less tortured than we are.
A nation occupied and oppressed and hopeless.
Of course the Palestinians are also to blame for the dead end.
Of course they had a part in the failure of the peace process.
But look at them for a moment in a different light.
Not only at the extremists among them, those who have an alliance of interests with our own extremists.
Look at the overwhelming majority of this miserable people, whose fate is bound up with ours whether we like it or not.
You will see a nation no less tortured than we are.
A nation occupied and oppressed and hopeless.
Of course the Palestinians are also to blame for the dead end.
Of course they had a part in the failure of the peace process.
But look at them for a moment in a different light.
Not only at the extremists among them, those who have an alliance of interests with our own extremists.
Look at the overwhelming majority of this miserable people, whose fate is bound up with ours whether we like it or not.
Go to the Palestinians, Mr.
Olmert.
Do not keep searching for reasons not to talk with them.
You gave up on the unilateral “convergence” plan.
That was the right thing to do.
But do not leave a void, for it will fill up at once with violence and destruction.
Talk to them.
Give them an offer that the moderates among them can accept (they are more numerous than the media suggest).
Give them a proposal, so that they will have to decide whether to accept it or remain hostages of a fanatic Islam.
Come to them with the bravest and most serious plan Israel is capable of offering.
With the proposal that every reasonable Israeli and Palestinian knows is the limit of refusal and compromise, ours and theirs.
If you delay, we will soon be nostalgic for the amateurism of Palestinian terror.
We will beat our heads and shout: How did we not employ all our intellectual resilience, all
our Israeli creativity, to uproot our enemy from within its own trap?
Olmert.
Do not keep searching for reasons not to talk with them.
You gave up on the unilateral “convergence” plan.
That was the right thing to do.
But do not leave a void, for it will fill up at once with violence and destruction.
Talk to them.
Give them an offer that the moderates among them can accept (they are more numerous than the media suggest).
Give them a proposal, so that they will have to decide whether to accept it or remain hostages of a fanatic Islam.
Come to them with the bravest and most serious plan Israel is capable of offering.
With the proposal that every reasonable Israeli and Palestinian knows is the limit of refusal and compromise, ours and theirs.
If you delay, we will soon be nostalgic for the amateurism of Palestinian terror.
We will beat our heads and shout: How did we not employ all our intellectual resilience, all
our Israeli creativity, to uproot our enemy from within its own trap?
Just as there is a war of no choice, there is also a peace of no choice.
Because there is no choice anymore.
We have no choice, and they have no choice.
And a peace of no choice should be pursued with the same determination and creativity with which one goes to a war of no choice.
Because there is no choice.
Whoever thinks there is, or that time is in our favor, does not grasp the dangerous underlying processes that are already occurring.
Because there is no choice anymore.
We have no choice, and they have no choice.
And a peace of no choice should be pursued with the same determination and creativity with which one goes to a war of no choice.
Because there is no choice.
Whoever thinks there is, or that time is in our favor, does not grasp the dangerous underlying processes that are already occurring.
Furthermore, Mr.
Prime Minister, perhaps you need to be reminded that if any Arab leader sends signals of peace, even the slightest and most hesitant ones, you must respond.
You must immediately find out whether he is sincere and in earnest.
You do not have the moral right not to respond.
You must do this for the sake of those whose lives you will demand as sacrifice if another war breaks out.
If President Assad says Syria wants peace, even if you do not believe him—and we are all suspicious—you must offer to meet with him that very same day.
Do not wait even one day.
When you went to war, you did not wait so much as one minute.
You stormed the battlefield with all your power.
With all your weapons.
With all your powers of destruction.
Why is it that when there is a flicker of peace, you immediately reject it?
What do you have to lose?
Do you suspect the Syrian president?
Go and present him with terms that will expose his plot.
Offer him a peace process that will
continue for a number of years, after which, if he meets all conditions, all restrictions, he will get the Golan Heights back.
Hold him to a process of continued dialogue.
Act in such a way that this possibility will emerge in the consciousness of his people.
Help the moderates, who surely exist there too.
Try to shape reality and not merely be its collaborator.
That is what you were elected to do.
That—precisely that.
Prime Minister, perhaps you need to be reminded that if any Arab leader sends signals of peace, even the slightest and most hesitant ones, you must respond.
You must immediately find out whether he is sincere and in earnest.
You do not have the moral right not to respond.
You must do this for the sake of those whose lives you will demand as sacrifice if another war breaks out.
If President Assad says Syria wants peace, even if you do not believe him—and we are all suspicious—you must offer to meet with him that very same day.
Do not wait even one day.
When you went to war, you did not wait so much as one minute.
You stormed the battlefield with all your power.
With all your weapons.
With all your powers of destruction.
Why is it that when there is a flicker of peace, you immediately reject it?
What do you have to lose?
Do you suspect the Syrian president?
Go and present him with terms that will expose his plot.
Offer him a peace process that will
continue for a number of years, after which, if he meets all conditions, all restrictions, he will get the Golan Heights back.
Hold him to a process of continued dialogue.
Act in such a way that this possibility will emerge in the consciousness of his people.
Help the moderates, who surely exist there too.
Try to shape reality and not merely be its collaborator.
That is what you were elected to do.
That—precisely that.
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