"Amos Oz, Approaching 70, Sees Israel With a Bird's-Eye View"; By Ethan Bronner; C1
Amos Oz has asked himself the question, What if I were him? for several decades now - an important question, to be sure, certainly for one who is serious about being human.
Knowing Oz's politics, however - their unchanging manner, no matter what the current of events - perhaps, he needs to ask himself, How do I, myself, feel about these events? Indeed, loving one's neighbor - the Other, in much of Jewish thought - demands that one love oneself. Love of oneself, one's people, is not Oz's strength.
As he conceded in a 1990 interview that Ethan Bronner quotes in this article, “There’s always a part of me that’s uninvolved, that sits on the sidelines and observes. Sometimes it looks on from the distance, almost hostile. Very chilly.”
That is hardly the description of a man of his people. It is one of a man who is aloof, who specializes in criticizing his own from an emotional distance. Such a tendency, though not necessarily a weakness - and even, conceivably, a strength - has proven itself to be detrimental to the Jewish state, in Oz's case.
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Intelligent remarks, Abes.
ReplyDeleteI would place this article on the category of "Heralding the Failures of the Jewish States." Oz is a perfect figure for such an agenda, given his unyielding and incessant criticism for Israel's government and its people at all terms. As you note, he is no man of the people, despite the popularity of his literature.
Through the article's title, however, Oz "Sees Israel with Bird's Eye View," Bronner instills the Israeli author with a wisdom that I believe we would argue he does not possess (at least on political issues).
Rather than expressing empathy for both sides, I believe that Oz expresses greater self-absorption. He desires to express empathy for the Palestinians, but he cannot imagine that some of them do not want to achieve the same peace he yearns for. Instead he instills them with a desire for peace which they do not really possess. He cannot imagine, or face, that the Palestinians seek different goals than Israelis.
And his comments on Gaza are simply atrocious and demonstrate his alienation and fringe views within Israeli society. To claim that "streets were bulldozed to the ground" is a gross perversion of Operation Cast Lead. But for Oz, Israel can't really be the good guy.