British author Ian McEwan learns it's a zero-sum game
British author Ian McEwan was in Jerusalem on Sunday to accept the Jerusalem prize for literature at the opening of the Jerusalem International Book Fair. McEwan took the opportunity to attack Israel. Before an audience that included Israel's president, Shimon Peres, culture minister, Limor Livnat, and Jerusalem mayor, Nir Barkat, McEwan spoke of the nihilism on both sides of the conflict.The nihilism in the Abuelaish case was that the family stayed in Gaza after repeatedly being urged to move to Israel, that Hamas had a weapons and ammunition storage facility in the Abuelaish's residential building and that Hamas posted snipers on the roof of that building. Read the full story here.
Addressing his remarks at the opening ceremony of Jerusalem's international book fair to "Israeli and Palestinian citizens of this beautiful city", the novelist said: "Hamas has embraced the nihilism of the suicide bomber, of rockets fired blindly into towns, and the nihilism of the extinctionist policy towards Israel."
But it was also nihilism that fired a rocket at the home of the Gazan doctor, Izzeldin Abuelaish, killing three of his daughters and a niece during the Gazan war. "And it is nihilism to make a long-term prison camp of the Gaza Strip. Nihilism has unleashed a tsunami of concrete across the occupied territories."
The author referred to "continued evictions and relentless purchases of Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem, the process of the right of return granted to Jews but not to Arabs, the so-called facts on the ground of hardening concrete over the future, over future generations of Palestinian and Israeli children who will inherit the conflict and find it even more difficult to resolve than it is today."
He called for an end to settlements and encroachments on Palestinian land.
Despite his stinging criticisms, to which his audience listened in silence, McEwan said he was "deeply, deeply touched to be awarded this honour that recognises writing which promotes the idea of the freedom of the individual in society".
But if he didn't know it before, McEwan certainly knows now that the Israeli-'Palestinian' dispute is a zero-sum game. Because he accepted an award from Israel, the 'Palestinians' are now shunning McEwan.
Having shrugged off calls to refuse an Israeli literary honor, Ian McEwan has found himself boycotted by Palestinian writers with whom he had sought to help foster peaceful dialogue.McEwan is donating his $10,000 prize to Combatants for Peace, an organisation of former Israeli soldiers and former Palestinian terrorists.
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McEwan planned to tour Jerusalem, the stone-walled heart of the Middle East conflict, and meet Israeli authors like David Grossman, whose meditations on the nation's ills were shot through with tragedy when he lost a son to the 2006 Lebanon war.
But Palestinian writers McEwan had hoped to see begged off.
"The message has come through to me that they can't meet me. They won't meet me. Pressure has been brought to bear - I guess, of a parallel but probably much more vigorous kind than was brought to bear on me," McEwan said, without naming them.
Labels: Ian McEwan, Izzeldin Abuelaish
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 11:18 PM
3 Comments:
"The nihilism in the Abuelaish case was that the family stayed in Gaza after repeatedly being urged to move to Israel, that Hamas had a weapons and ammunition storage facility in the Abuelaish's residential building and that Hamas posted snipers on the roof of that building."
So that means, as I read the Geneva Conventions, that that civilian building had lost it's civilian protected status, due entirely to the unlawful actions of the Hamas Unlawful Combatants regarding the building and it's civilian inhabitants. Israeli forces had a legal right to take necessary military measures and attack that building. The consequences of any Israeli attack on the civilian inhabitants and their property are legally entirely the responsibility of the Hamas Unlawful Combatants, whose unlawful actions prompted the attack.
I'm not a lawyer. Carl, would you say my interpretation of the Conventions is accurate?
"McEwan is donating his $10,000 prize to Combatants for Peace, an organisation of former Israeli soldiers and former Palestinian terrorists."
You ought to read the Wikipedia article on Combatants for Peace. I was surprised not to see "by the PLO Ministry of Propaganda" as author credits.
has anyone ever asked that doctor why he kept his family in a war zone, even though he was offered safe passage out?
and will someone please ask the genius mcewan when buying property became a crime?
a "tsunami" of concrete? if he had put that line into one of his novels, the critics would have had a field day.
the true nihilism comes from mr mcewan, who knows nothing about the situation between the arabs and the israelis, yet that doesnt stop him from opening his big yap.
I stumbled on this while looking for an image of Ian McEwan. It seems that he was pretty balanced and fair in his summary. Gaza is the world's biggest prison, and so overcrowded that it would be difficult for Hamas not to operate near civilian areas.
It's hard not to see the irony of Zionists, who 'recaptured' the promised land through terrorism (King David Hotel anyone?), and elected a leader (Begin) who was a self-confessed terrorist leader now condemning Palestinians who are in an almost identical situation. Fortunately, the British didn't respond to the murder of 91 people with airstrikes, and the killing of the families of men like Begin, who wouldn't take on the British army face to face.
Surely Israelis must realise that occupying someone's land and forcing a population to live in a ghetto is likely to result in an uprising? Has history taught us nothing?
I have no love for Hamas, and have no wish to see Israelis killed any more than I wish to see Palestinians blown up in their own houses. However, if you think that the only solution is for the Palestinian people to accept the occupation of their land, internment of their people, loss of water rights and to be treated as second-class citizens in their own homes, there is little hope for peace. Would Israelis accept this treatment?
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