Amos Oz, the novelist whose stories and tales have probedthe soul of Israel with an intimate insistence, greeted me to his book-linedapartment with a quick Hebrew lesson. I must understand that the key word,Yiddish really, is “fraiers” “ or suckers.
“Most Israelis,” he suggested, “would wave goodbye to theWest Bank but they don’t want to be suckers, they don’t want the Gaza scenarioto repeat itself. First and foremost, these elections were about internalaffairs, the middle class, state and synagogue, the draft, with a silentconsensus that the occupied territories do not matter that much. Israelis areno longer interested. They vote with their feet. They don’t go there, exceptfor the settlers and right-wing extremists. This means that if Israelis can bereassured that by renouncing the West Bank they are not going to get a lousydeal “ not going to be ‘fraiers’ “ they are quietly ready to do it.”
With religious-nationalist sentiment strong, even if theelections demonstrated an Israeli turn against extremism, I suggested Oz mightbe optimistic. But he insisted that at the end of the day some 70 percent onboth sides “ kicking and screaming and crying injustice “ were ready for twostates. “If I may use a metaphor,” Oz said, “I would say that the patient,Israeli and Palestinian, is unhappily ready for surgery, while the doctors arecowards.”
Among the cowards, would he include Prime Minister BenjaminNetanyahu? “Yes I think Netanyahu is a coward,” he declared. But the victory ofthe center in the election could alter the equation. “It means,” Oz said, “thatthere will be more pressure on Netanyahu from the dovish side in Israel andfrom the outside world, so that his cowardice may work the other way.”
His message to the incoming Israeli government is clear:Peace is impossible without boldness; nothing is beyond the capacity of anopen-ended, surprise-prone humanity.
There is wistfulness in his gaze on the Israel he loves. Hemarvels at what he calls “a cultural golden age” of literary and scientificachievement. He deplores “ and abhors “ what he sees as a creeping questioningof Israel’s existence in Europe and elsewhere, one that “goes way beyondlegitimate criticism of Israeli policy” and in part reflects anti-Americanismbecause “if the United States is the devil then Israel must be Rosemary’sBaby.”
At the same time he does not hide his own disappointments.“Building settlements in occupied territories was the single most grave errorand sin in the history of modern Zionism, because it was based on a refusal toaccept the simple fact that we are not alone in this country,” he told me. “ThePalestinians for decades also refused the fact that they are not alone in thiscountry. Now, with clenched teeth, both sides have recognized this reality andthat is a good basis.”
Israel was a dream. The only way, Oz notes, to keep a dreamrosy and intact and unsullied is never to live it out. This is true ofeverything “ traveling, writing a novel, a sexual fantasy. Israel is now a fulfilleddream, one that exceeds the wildest dreams of his parents. So, Oz concludes,“The disappointment is not in the nature of Israel, it is in the nature ofdreams.”
Here is his political credo. There cannot be one statebecause Israelis and Palestinians cannot become one happy family (“they are notone and they are not happy.”) So “the only solution is turning the house intotwo smaller apartments.” Two states, absolutely, are the only answer. Realitynow compels a compromise “ “and compromises are unhappy, there is no such thingas a happy compromise.”
And what of Hamas? “At least what we can do is solve theconflict with the Palestine Liberation Organization and reduce theIsraeli-Palestinian conflict to an Israel-Gaza conflict. Hamas may change asthe P.L.O. did. They will go on dreaming of Haifa and Jaffa just as we willdream of Hebron and Nablus. There is no censorship on dreams.” And thePalestinian right of return? “The right of return is a euphemism for theliquidation of Israel. Even for a dove like myself this is out of the question.Refugees must be resettled in the future state of Palestine, not Israel.”
A final thought from Oz worth the consideration of Israelipoliticians: “I live in the desert at Arad. Every morning at 5 am. I start myday by taking a walk before sunrise. I inhale the silence. I take in thebreeze, the silhouettes of the hills. I walk for about 40 minutes. When I comeback home I turn on the radio and sometimes I hear a politician using wordslike ‘never’ or ‘forever’ or ‘for eternity’ “ and I know that the stones out inthe desert are laughing at him.”
Sit down with Oz. That is my advice to the next Israeligovernment “ and to all the deluded absolutists, Arab and Jew, of thisunnecessary conflict whose unhappy but peaceful ending is not beyond the scopeof open-ended human imagination.
Roger Cohen is a British-bornjournalist and author. He is a columnist for The New York Times andInternational Herald Tribune.
