BOOKS

The Bitter Taste of Dreams Come True

Author Amos Oz speaks on Israel and Palestine, the dream of Zionism and how politicians listen to artists and then forget everything they're told.

By Joanna Chen | Newsweek Web Exclusive

Feb 14, 2008 | Updated: 5:49 p.m. ET Feb 14, 2008

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Posted By: chupacabra @ 02/24/2008 4:59:04 PM

Comment: Obama smoked crack cocaine and had gay sex in Chicago in the back of a limo with Larry Sinclair in 1999, when Obama was a state representative in the Illinois legislature. Sinclair filed suit on Obama and the Democratic National Committee to compel release of this information to the public on 2/11/08. Sinclair took a polygraph test on 2/22/08 and the results will be released to the national media early next week. (He passed with flying colors.) Check out WHITEHOUSE DOT COM for the details. Bill O"Reilly has stated that he will run with the story next week once he reviews the polygraph.
Posted By: fabronder @ 02/18/2008 9:00:46 AM

Comment: i can feeling the book's spriit,because the same experience with suffering heart-breaken times.
------My name is wayland. Before, My life is full of loneliness and discrimination. I had few friends. I was afraid of coming out. Till one day, my friends told a good place gaysinglehunt.com where i made many gay friends. My life changed, no longer lonely,no discrimination. I am a happy gay now. I just want to say: Gay orientation isn???t wrong.
Posted By: David mulenex @ 02/15/2008 3:37:50 PM

Comment: Oz is right; the wisdom of bestowing dignity to the losses of each side by the other is impossible without changing the shape of the future in Israel and the West Bank and Gaza. The war of endless attrition, knowable and kept separate from dreams, and fed by deaths caused without remorse by both sides, seems preferable to life with half a heart, half a Jerusalem, half a country and half a dream.
Posted By: hamsa @ 02/15/2008 2:38:06 PM

Comment: Oz's words are elegant and balanced. Right and Right could be a title for this conflict. The 'mozt' significant point he makes is also the most muted. Until the world at large acknowledges Israel as legitimate, and this includes Arab countries first and foremost, Israel will not feel the confidence it needs to make difficult concessions. Every time someone threatens to destroy Israel or maligns the very nature of Zionism and Jews, they add another brick to Israel's protective wall. This has to come in the form of Moderate nations strenuously condemning Rocket from Gaze for example, instead of the watered down "both sides are wrong statements, which only encourages Hamas' sense of good standing in their actions. That is not to say that all of Israel's actions are to be defended, but when there is something as clear as Hamas' provocations against an Israel that has left Gaza already, the world has to support Israel in their cause against them. Otherwise, how can people expect Israel pull out of the West Bank if they have an expectation that this could happen there as well, with the world again making statements like "both sides are wrong."
Posted By: The_Defender @ 02/15/2008 1:57:28 PM

Comment: Actually, not only can there be a happy ending, there MUST be one. If both sides (Israeli and Palestinian) are not happy with whatever solution/compromise is eventually agreed upon, the best that will happen will only be a truce/stalemate which future generations will try to "correct".
Posted By: hotair @ 02/15/2008 12:53:04 PM

Comment: I must most strenuously disagree with Mr. Oz???s statement about the conflict being between ???right, and right???!

???You've talked about a compromise of pain and clenched teeth. Can't there be a happy ending????
???No, I don't believe in a happy ending to this kind of tragic conflict. Essentially because this is a conflict between right and right. Any compromise will mean concession; it will mean renouncing something which both parties very strongly regard as their own, and both parties had very good reasons to regard as their own, so a compromise will be like an amputation for both sides. There are no happy compromises. ???

This leads to the problem of who is more right. Which implies that someone must be wrong, or at the very least less right. The current conflict has nothing to do with right, or wrong.

First, and foremost, it is about trust. Here the Arabs are the victims of their own leaders, and their own history.

All throughout Israel???s short history, every time that they have trusted someone, they have been betrayed. As a result they have learned that they cannot trust anyone. For the Arabs to simply tell the Israel???s that they are going to have to trust them, this time! Is not going to work. First: Because no one has to trust anyone else! Second: No one is going to earn someone else???s trust simply by demanding it.

Secondly it is about believing. There can be no solution, until people start believing that there is one. When the Israeli???s say that they are not going to go anywhere! The rest of the world has to learn to believe them! When Hamas, and Hezbollah (and all of the rest on the list) say that there is nothing to negotiate, as long as Israel continues to exist! The rest of the world is going to have to learn to believe them too!

Between survival, and extinction, there is no middle ground.
Posted By: hotair @ 02/15/2008 12:49:40 PM

Comment: I must most strenuously disagree with Mr. Oz???s statement about the conflict being between ???right, and right???!

???You've talked about a compromise of pain and clenched teeth. Can't there be a happy ending????
???No, I don't believe in a happy ending to this kind of tragic conflict. Essentially because this is a conflict between right and right. Any compromise will mean concession; it will mean renouncing something which both parties very strongly regard as their own, and both parties had very good reasons to regard as their own, so a compromise will be like an amputation for both sides. There are no happy compromises. ???

This leads to the problem of who is more right. Which implies that someone must be wrong, or at the very least less right. The current conflict has nothing to do with right, or wrong.

First, and foremost, the current conflict is about trust. Here the Arabs are the victims of their own leaders, and their own history.

All throughout Israel???s short history, every time that they have trusted someone, they have been betrayed. As a result they have learned that they cannot trust anyone. For the Arabs to simply tell the Israel???s that they are going to have to trust them, this time! Is not going to work. First: Because no one has to trust anyone else! Second: No one is going to earn someone else???s trust simply by demanding it.

Secondly it is about believing. There can be no solution, until people start believing that there is one. When the Israeli???s say that they are not going to go anywhere! The rest of the world has to learn to believe them! When Hamas, and Hezbollah (and all of the rest on the list) say that there is nothing to negotiate, as long as Israel continues to exist! The rest of the world is going to have to learn to believe them too!

Between survival, and extinction, there is no middle ground.
Posted By: Ganpat @ 02/15/2008 8:20:50 AM

Comment: The bitterest taste is that of the writer who has nothing to write about.

Disillusiion is a ready subject.

So go for it, Oz. It'll keep you in bread.
- Posted By: ReasonableGuy @ 02/15/2008 12:06:00
  
  Comment: Good job Ganpat! Extremely wise comment! Here's an idea.... Try to open your mind to new ideas rather than castrate others!!! idiot!
- Posted By: ReasonableGuy @ 02/15/2008 12:04:19
  
  Comment: Nice one Ganpat! It's pretty easy to castrate ones thoughts and feelings. You should try it before criticizing, idiot!