The writer of lucid, hard reflections leaves, not always loved by his compatriots who considered him an intellectual too engagé with the other party, like his friends David Grossman and Amos Oz
Just a month ago, in the aftermath of the murder of the Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, he whispered, in his usual small, gentle voice, “I’m not well, I’m sick, I can’t speak, much less talk about painful things.” Now that Abraham B. Yehoshua is gone – Alef Bet Yehoshu’a, as they said in Tel Aviv – those words of his with so many silences open a huge void, in Israel but also here, in Italy, where the great writer of the century last had perhaps even more admirers than at home.
There is little to add to death, indeed nothing. If not recover from life the seeds to grow again. And Yehoshua’s novels are full of these. “Mr. Mani”, a sort of Middle Eastern “Buddenbrook”, “The Human Resources Manager”, the superb “Journey to the end of the Millennium”, “The tunnel”, one of the last books to come to us. And then there are the unwritten reflections, talks, meetings, interviews, the chronicle of the present that Yehoshua has never escaped, in his home in Haifa first – the problematic Israeli Arab melting pot overlooking the Mediterranean – and then from the nearby refuge. Tel Aviv, where, now a widower, he had retired to be closer to his grandchildren. Lucid, hard reflections, not always loved by his compatriots who considered him an intellectual too engaged in dialogue with the Palestinians, like his friends David Grossman and Amos Oz, who also died.
He had welcomed the agreements of Abraham, Yehoshua with hope. Even admitting, among the few, that they were the tombstone on the birth of a Palestinian state. He had commented harshly with The print the clashes of a year ago in Jerusalem, following the threat of eviction for some Arab families pressured by the claims of a group of the Jewish right, “a provocation that sabotages the already compromised peace process”. A j’accuse to Palestinian radicalism but also to their compatriots and politicians who are now determined to support the most extreme part.
Unlimited access to all site content
€ 1 / month for 3 months, then € 3.99 / month for 3 months
Unlock unlimited access to all content on the site
#Alef #Bet #Yehoshua #seeds #life #cultivate #dialogue #Palestinians