Literature

Multilingual
Fiction

Studies-Books
7

ِِِA.I.C.L
Symposiums

دفتر
الزوار

للإتصال
بنا

Studies
and Books 7

Jordanian
Ministry of Culture & J.W.S Leading
Normalisation with Israel

ورسالة استباقية لحركة شعراء العالم من
حركة إبداع تحذرها من المخطط الأردني للزج
بالشعراء العرب في تطبيع مجاني قبل نشر إبداع
لأسمائهم تحت مظلة مهرجان جرش وباسم الشعر المنثور

الرابطة الدولية للنقد
الأدبي

الأصدقاء
الأعزاء

تعمل
رابطتنا على انتخاب مجلس إدارة جديد. ويمكن ترشيح
كافة الأعضاء القدماء والجدد منذ بداية
اشتراكهم.

تبدأ
إنتخابات مجلس الإدارة بعد الاجتماع العام الذي
يقام في التاسع عشر من تشرين الأول (أكتوبر) 2007
في فندق غوين، حيث المكان التاريخي.

وفي
الوقت نفسه يقام الاجتماع الدولي للرابطة حول (روح
المقاومة في الأدب) الجمعة والسبت19-20/10/2007.
وهذا البريد(الرسالة الالكترونية) دعوة للمرشحين
في مجلس الإدارة الجديد.

ونود
أن نضع في اعتبارنا أن المرشحين المستقبليين قد
بلغوا  قبل الأول من أيلول(سبتمبر)
2007

ويذكر
أن كتاب الاجتماع العام 2006 حول "تداخل
الأدب" تحت الطبع،  وسيصل كافة الأعضاء نسخ
منه بالبريد.

رئيس
الرابطة

دانييل
لوفرس

Daniel Leuwers

A
.
I
.
C
.
L

ASSOCIATION
INTERNATIONALE DE LA CRITIQUE
LITTERAIRE

10  juin
2007

Chers Amis,

Notre Association va statutairement être
appelée à élire un nouveau Conseil
d’Administration. Peuvent être candidats tous
les membres (sortants ou nouveaux) à jour de
leurs cotisations.

L’élection de ce Conseil d’Administration
(qui décidera ensuite de la composition du
Bureau) aura lieu lors de l’Assemblée Générale
Extraordinaire qui se tiendra le vendredi 19
octobre 2007 en fin d’après-midi ,  à
l’Hôtel Gouïn –lieu historique et musée sis dans
le Vieux-Tours- en même temps qu’y sera organisé
le colloque international de l’AICL sur
« L’Esprit de résistance en
littérature » (le vendredi mais aussi le
samedi).

Avant la
grande parenthèse de l’été, ce courrier est un
appel à candidatures au nouveau Conseil
d’Administration.

Ne
pourront être prises en considération que les
candidatures reçues avant le 1er septembre 2007.
Les courriers de convocation à l’Assemblée
Générale Extraordinaire seront expédiés dans la
première quinzaine de
septembre.

Le
colloque de 2006 « Le Métissage en
littérature » est sous presse, et tous les
adhérents le recevront par la poste ou lors du
prochain colloque à
Tours.

En
très cordiale pensée,

Daniel Leuwers

تنشر حركة
إبداع ملخصا لكلمة الناقد العربي تيسير نظمي في
مؤتمر باريس "روح المقاومة في الأدب"

الذي يعقد في فندق غوين
بالتزامن مع انتخابات الهيئة الإدارية لرابطة نقاد
الأدب الدولية
(A.I.C.L)
ويحضره نقاد كبار
من مختلف دول العالم ويشارك به ناقد عربي لأول مرة
منذ تأسيس الرابطة الدولية عام 1969 وتسجيلها في
قائمة المنظمات غير الحكومية في اليونيسكو عام
1971، وفيما يلي الملخص للكلمة/النص باللغات:
الإنجليزية والفرنسية والإسبانية والإيطالية
والألمانية والبرتغالية والروسية. وستنشر حركة
إبداع الترجمات باللغات الباقية مثل: الصينية
والتركية والفارسية والكورية واليابانية في وقت
لاحق

Next to
A.I.C.L Symposiums ملخص بسبع لغات في
التالية

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/868385.html

Last
update - 00:00 08/06/2007

Leaving the
Zionist
ghetto

By Ari
Shavit

We met 25 years ago. Exactly 25 years
ago. Avraham - Avrum - Burg and I were then part
of a small group of reserve soldiers and
officers who came out against the First Lebanon
War. "Soldiers Against Silence," we were called.
Very quickly Avrum was taken from us. In the
great demonstration of the 400,000 [the peace
rally in Tel Aviv following the September 1982
massacre in the Sabra and Chatilla camps in
Beirut], he
became a star and immediately turned to
politics. At first he was one of Shimon Peres'
smart young men. Then he was the great hope of
the Labor Party's Young Guard. After that the
chairman of the Jewish Agency, Speaker of the
Knesset, a candidate for the Labor
leadership.
And then, suddenly, three years
ago, Burg got up and left. Went to feather his
nest. Got entangled in a problematic and failed
privatization deal. Was slandered in the papers,
scrutinized by the state comptroller,
investigated by the police. And all this time he
was writing a book.
All this time he was
formulating the bold insights of "Defeating
Hitler."
Burg will not admit it, but from his
point of view the book he is launching now, to
coincide with Hebrew Book Week, is a book of
prophecy. A book that is intended to vest the
kingdom with prophecy. For others, the book will
not be easily definable. It contains deep
thoughts about Israel and
Zionism, a prolonged comparison between
Israel and
Germany,
trenchant criticism of Eichmann's hanging,
reflections on Judaism in the age of
globalization and memories from his father's
house.
Yosef Burg, the refugee from Dresden,
accords the book a certain softness that is not
to be found in the angry words of his son. True,
toward the end the optimist Avrum tries to
transform his eulogy into a paean, but the
attempt is not entirely convincing. The
Israel
of "Defeating Hitler" is a very harsh place.
Brutal and imperialist, confrontational and
insular. A shallow place, thuggish, lacking
spiritual inspiration.
I was outraged by the
book. I saw it as a turning away of an Israeli
colleague from our shared Israeliness. I saw it
as a one-dimensional and unempathetic attack on
the Israeli experience. Still, the dialogue with
Avrum was riveting. We got angry at each other
and raised our voices at each other and circled
each other warily like two wounded gladiators in
the arena. You can't take away from Avrum what
he has. You can't take away the education or the
articulateness or the ability to touch truly
painful places. Maybe that's why he is so
infuriating. Friend and predator; brother and
deserter.
Avrum Burg, I read your
new book, "Defeating Hitler," as a parting from
Zionism. Am I wrong? Are you still a
Zionist?

"I am a human being, I am a Jew and I am
an Israeli. Zionism was an instrument to move me
from the Jewish state of being to the Israeli
state of being. I think it was Ben-Gurion who
said that the Zionist movement was the
scaffolding to build the home, and that after
the state's establishment it should be
dismantled."
So you confirm that you
are no longer a Zionist?
"Already
at the First Zionist Congress, Herzl's Zionism
was victorious over the Zionism of Ahad Ha'am. I
think that the 21st century should be the
century of Ahad Ha'am. We have to leave Herzl
behind and move to Ahad Ha'am."
Does this mean that you
no longer find the notion of a Jewish state
acceptable?
"It can't work
anymore. To define the State of Israel as a
Jewish state is the key to its end. A Jewish
state is explosive. It's dynamite."
And a Jewish-democratic
state?
"People find this very
comfortable. It's lovely. It's schmaltzy. It's
nostalgic. It's retro. It gives a sense of
fullness. But 'Jewish-democratic' is
nitroglycerine."
We have to change the
national anthem?
"The anthem is a
symbol. I would be ready to buy into a reality
in which everything is fine and only the anthem
is screwed-up."
Do we have to amend the
Law of Return?
"We have to open
the discussion. The Law of Return is an
apologetic law. It is the mirror image of
Hitler. I don't want Hitler to define my
identity."
Should the Jewish Agency
be dismantled?
"Back when I was
chairman of the Jewish Agency, I suggested
changing its name from the Jewish Agency for the
Land of Israel to
the Jewish Agency for Israeli Society. There is
room for philanthropic tools. But at the center
of its experience it have to deal with all of
Israel's
citizens, including the Arabs."
You write in your book
that if Zionism is catastrophic Zionism, then
you are not only post-Zionist but anti-Zionist.
And I say that since the 1940s, the catastrophic
element has been integral to Zionism. It follows
that you are anti-Zionist.
"Ahad
Ha'am made the charge against Herzl that his
whole Zionism had its source in anti-Semitism.
He thought of something else, of Israel
as a spiritual center - the Ahad Ha'am line has
not died, and now its time has come. Our
confrontational Zionism vis-a-vis the world is
disastrous."
But it's not just the
Zionist issue. Your book is anti-Israeli, in the
deepest sense. It is a book from which loathing
of Israeliness emanates.
"When I
was a boy I was a Jew. In the language prevalent
here: a Jew-boy. I attended a heder [religious
school]. I was taught by former yeshiva
students. After that, for most of my life I was
an Israeli. Language, signs, smells, tastes,
places. Everything. Today that is not enough for
me. In my situation today, I am beyond Israeli.
Of the three identities that form me - human,
Jewish and Israeli - I feel that the Israeli
element deprives the other two."
On the face of it, your
position is conciliatory and humanistic. But out
of that approach you develop a very harsh
attitude toward Israeliness and Israelis. You
say terrible things about us.
"I
think that I have written a book of love. Love
hurts. If I were writing about Nicaragua,
I wouldn't care. But I am coming from a place of
tremendous pain. I see my love withering before
my eyes. I see my society and the place I was
raised in and my home being
destroyed."
Love? You write that
Israelis understand only force. If someone were
to write that Arabs understand only force or
that the Turkmen understand only force, he would
immediately be condemned as a racist. And
rightly.

"You can't take one sentence and say that
this is the whole book."
It's not just one
sentence. It is repeated. You say that we have
force, a great deal of force and only force. You
say that Israel
is a Zionist ghetto, an imperialistic, brutish
place that believes only in
itself.
"Look at the
Lebanon
War. The people returned from the field of
battle. There were certain achievements, there
were certain failures, things were revealed. You
would expect people in the mainstream and even
on the right to understand that when the IDF is
allowed to win, it doesn't win. That force is
not a solution. But then comes Gaza, and what is the
Gaza discourse?
We will smash them, we will erase them. Nothing
has sunk in. Nothing. And it's not just between
nation and nation. Look at the relations between
people. Listen to the personal conversation. The
graph of violence on the roads, the discourse of
the battered women. Look at the mirror of
Israel's
face."
What
you are saying is that the problem is not just
the occupation. In your eyes,
Israel
as a whole is some sort of horrible
mutation.
"The occupation is a
very small part of it. Israel
is a frightened society. To look for the source
of the obsession with force and to uproot it,
you have to deal with the fears. And the
meta-fear, the primal fear is the six million
Jews who perished in the Holocaust."
That is the book's
thesis. You are not the first to propose it, but
you formulate it very acutely. We are psychic
cripples, you claim. We are gripped by dread and
fear and make use of force because Hitler caused
us deep psychic
damage.
"Yes."
Well, I will counter by
saying that your description is distorted. It's
not as though we are living in
Iceland
and imagining that we are surrounded by Nazis
who actually disappeared 60 years ago. We are
surrounded by genuine threats. We are one of the
most threatened countries in the
world.
"The true Israeli rift
today is between those who believe and those who
are afraid. The great victory of the Israeli
right in the struggle for the Israeli political
soul lies in the way it has imbued it almost
totally with absolute paranoia. I accept that
there are difficulties. But are they absolute?
Is every enemy Auschwitz? Is Hamas a
scourge?"
You
are patronizing and supercilious, Avrum. You
have no empathy for Israelis. You treat the
Israeli Jew as a paranoid. But as the cliche
goes, some paranoids really are persecuted. On
the day we are speaking, Ahmadinejad is saying
that our days are numbered. He promises to
eradicate us. No, he is not Hitler. But he is
also not a mirage. He is a true threat. He is
the real world - a world you
ignore.
"I say that as of this
moment, Israel
is a state of trauma in nearly every one of its
dimensions. And it's not just a theoretical
question. Would our ability to cope with
Iran not be much
better if we renewed in Israel
the ability to trust the world? Would it not be
more right if we didn't deal with the problem on
our own, but rather as part of a world alignment
beginning with the Christian churches, going on
to the governments and finally the
armies?
"Instead, we say we do not trust the
world, they will abandon us, and here's
Chamberlain returning from Munich with the
black umbrella and we will bomb them
alone."
In
your book we are not only victims of the Nazis.
In your book we are almost Judeo-Nazis. You are
careful. You do not actually say that
Israel is Nazi
Germany.
But you come very close. You say that
Israel is
pre-Nazi Germany.
Israel is
Germany
up to the Nazis.
"Yes. I started
the book from the saddest place. As mourning,
but for the loss of Israel.
During most of the writing the book's title was
'Hitler Won.' I was sure it was finished. But
slowly I discovered the layer of not everything
being lost. And I discovered my father as a
representative of German Jewry that was ahead of
its time. These two themes nourished the book
from beginning to end. In the end I am an
optimistic person, and the end of the book is
also optimistic."

The end may be
optimistic, but throughout its entire course the
book repeatedly equates Israel with
Germany.
Is that really justified? Is there sufficient
basis for the Israel-Germany
analogy?
"It is not an exact
science, but I will describe to you some of the
elements that go into the stew: a great sense of
national insult; a feeling that the world has
rejected us; unexplained losses in wars. And, as
a result, the centrality of militarism in our
identity. The place of reserve officers in
society. The number of armed Israelis in the
streets. Where is this swarm of armed people
going? The expressions hurled publicly: 'Arabs
out.'"
What
you are actually claiming is that we have
viruses of Nazism within us.
"The
term 'Nazism' is extremely charged."
Avrum Burg writes in his
new book: "It is sometimes difficult for me to
distinguish between the primeval
National-Socialism and some national cultural
doctrines of the
here-and-now."
"There is a
difference between saying 'Nazi' and saying
'National-Socialist.' Nazi is an ultimate icon;
in us it goes to final and terminal
places."
OK,
we will leave Nazism. Are you concerned about a
fascist debacle in Israel?
"I
think it is already here."
Do you really believe
that the racist slogans which, appallingly, do
indeed appear on the stone walks in Jerusalem are akin to the
slogans of the 1930s in Germany?
"I
see that we are not weeding out those utterances
with all our might. And I hear voices coming out
of Sderot .... We will destroy and kill and
expel. And there is a transferist discourse in
the government .... We have crossed so many red
lines in the past few years. And then you ask
yourself what the next red lines that we cross
will be."
In
the book you both ask and answer. "I feel very
strongly," you write, "that there is a very good
chance that a future Knesset in
Israel ... will
prohibit sexual relations with Arabs, use
administrative means to prevent Arabs from
employing Jewish cleaning ladies and workers ...
like the Nuremberg Laws
... All this will happen, and is already
happening." Didn't you get carried away,
Avrum?
"When I was Speaker of the
Knesset, I heard people talking. I conducted
in-depth conversations with members from all
parts of the House. I heard people of peace say
-I want peace because I hate Arabs and can't
stand to look at them and can't tolerate them, -
and I heard people on the right use Kahanist
language. Kahanism [referring to the
ultranational doctrine of Rabbi Meir Kahane] is
in the Knesset. It was disqualified as a party,
but it constitutes 10 and maybe 15 and maybe
even 20 percent of the Jewish discourse in the
Knesset. These matters are far from simple.
These are roiling waters."
I will tell you frankly.
I think we have serious moral and psychological
problems. But I think that the comparison with
Germany
on the eve of the rise of Nazism to power is
baseless. One example: There is a problem with
the place of the army in our lives and with the
place of the generals in our politics and in the
relations between the political echelon and the
army. But you are likening Israeli militarism to
German militarism, and that is a false
comparison. You describe Israel as a
Prussian Sparta
living by the sword, and that is not the
Israel
I see outside. Certainly not in
2007.
"I envy your ability to read
the situation as you read it. I very much envy
you. But I think we are a society that in its
feelings lives by the sword .... It is not by
chance that I make the comparison with
Germany, because
our feeling that we are obliged to live by the
sword stems from Germany.
What they deprived us of in the 12 years of
Nazism necessitates a very large sword. Look at
the fence. The separation fence is a fence
against paranoia. And it was born in my milieu.
In my school of thought. With my own Haim Ramon.
What is the thinking here? That I will erect a
big wall and the problem will be solved because
I will not see them. You know, the Labor
movement always saw the historical context and
represented a culture of dialogue, but here we
have terrible pettiness of soul. The fence
physically demarcates the end of Europe. It says that this
is where Europe
ends. It says that you are the forward post of
Europe and the
fence separates you from the barbarians. Like
the Roman Wall. Like the Wall of China.
But that is so pathetic. And it is a bill of
divorce from the vision of integration. There is
something so xenophobic about it. So insane. And
it comes just at a time when Europe itself, and the
world with it, has made such an impressive
advance in internalizing the lessons of the
Holocaust and has fomented a great advance in
the normative behavior of
nations."

The truth is that you are
a salient Europist. You live in Nataf but you
are all Brussels. The
prophet of Brussels.
"Completely.
Completely. I see the European Union as a
biblical utopia. I don't know how long it will
hold together, but it is amazing. It is
completely Jewish."
And this admiration you
show for Europe
is not accidental. Because one of the riveting
things in your book is that the sabra Avrum Burg
turns his back on being sabra and connects very
deeply with some sort of yekke [a reference to
Jews of German origin] romanticism. Zionist
Israel
comes across as a vulgar baron in the book,
whereas German Jewry is the ideal and the
paragon.
"You are dichotomous,
Ari, and I am inclusive. You slice off and I try
to contain. Therefore I do not say that I am
turning my back on being sabra but that I am
turning in a different direction. And that is
true. Completely true."

I have a bone to pick
with this romanticism. You describe a thousand
wonderful years of German Jewry. In large
measure you view German Jewry as a model. But it
ends in Auschwitz, Avrum. It leads
to Auschwitz.
Your yekke romanticism is understandable and
attractive, but it lies.
"Is there
a well-grounded romanticism? Is your Israeli
romanticism grounded?"
My Israeliness is not
romantic. On the contrary: It is cruel. It stems
from understanding necessity. And you blur the
necessity. Emotionally, you prefer the move from
Dresden to
Manhattan over
coping with the Jewish-Israeli
fate.
"We do not want to accept
this, but the existence of the Diaspora dates
from the beginnings of our history. Abraham
discovers God outside the borders of the Land.
Jacob leads tribes to outside the borders. The
tribes become a people outside the borders. The
Torah is given outside the borders. As Israelis
and Zionists, we ignored this completely. We
rejected the Diaspora. But I maintain that just
as there was something astonishing about German
Jewry, in America,
too, they also created the potential for
something astonishing. They created a situation
in which the goy can be my father and my mother
and my son and my partner. The goy there is not
hostile but embracing. And as a result, what
emerges is a Jewish experience of integration,
not separation. Not segregation. I find those
things lacking here. Here the goy is what he was
in the ghetto: confrontational and
hostile."
There really is a deep
anti-Zionist pattern in you. Emotionally, you
are with German Jewry and American Jewry. They
excite you, thrill you, and by comparison you
find the Zionist option crude and spiritually
meager. It broadens neither the heart nor the
soul.
"Yes, yes. The Israeli
reality is not exciting. People are not willing
to admit it, but Israel
has reached the wall. Ask your friends if they
are certain their children will live here. How
many will say yes? At most 50 percent. In other
words, the Israeli elite has already parted with
this place. And without an elite there is no
nation."
You
are saying that we are suffocating here for lack
of spirit.
"Totally. We are
already dead. We haven't received the news yet,
but we are dead. It doesn't work anymore. It
doesn't work."

And you see in American
Jewry the spiritual dimension and the cultural
ferment that you don't find
here.
"Certainly. There is no
important Jewish writing in Israel.
There is important Jewish writing in the
United
States. There
is no one to talk to here. The religious
community of which I was a part - I feel no
sense of belonging to it. The secular community
- I am not part of it, either. I have no one to
talk to. I am sitting with you and you don't
understand me, either. You are stuck at a
chauvinist national extremity."
That is not completely
accurate. I am aware of the Jewish richness you
are talking about. But I am also aware that the
basic Zionist analysis was correct. Without
Israel
there is no future for a non-Orthodox Jewish
civilization.
"Take the purest
Israeliness there is. Moshe Dayan, for example.
And we will shed all the Avrums from him.
Totally immaculate Israeliness. No nudniks. No
effete types. Nothing. Are you sure that this
living-in-order-to-live will endure? Take on the
other hand the 'kites.' Martin Buber, George
Steiner. You say that these [ethereal] kites
will not get anywhere. But my historical
experience tells me that these kites get farther
than the troopers."
You are actually
preparing tools for exile.
"I
have been living with them from the day I was
born. What is it when I say in prayer that
because of our sins we were exiled from our
land? In Jewish history the spiritual existence
is eternal and the political existence is
temporary."
In this sense, you are
essentially non-Zionist. Because the energy
needed to establish and maintain this place is
tremendous, and you are saying that we must not
give our all to this
place.
"There is no Israeli
whole. There is a Jewish whole. The Israeli is a
half-Jew. Judaism always prepared alternatives.
The strategic mistake of Zionism was to annul
the alternatives. It built an enterprise here
whose most important sections are an illusion.
Do you really think that some sort of floating
secular Tel Aviv-type post-kibbutz entity will
[continue to] exist here? Never. Israeliness has
only body; it doesn't have soul. At most,
remnants of soul. You are already dead
spiritually, Ari. You have only an Israeli body.
If you go on like this, you will no longer
be."
Israeliness is far
richer, Avrum. It has energy and vibrancy and
diversity and productivity. But you fled from
Israeliness. You defected from Israeliness. You
were an Israeli. You were more Israeli than I
was. But no more.
"No more. I
think that the 'non-Israeli' is not an
alternative to the whole Jewish existence of two
thousand years that I am talking about. That is
why I wrote this book. Because I cannot leave
this world while lying to myself. I told you:
There is no Jewish existence without a
narrative. There is no such thing. And here
there is certainly no narrative. But what is
even graver is that there are no forces that
will draw out a narrative from
within.
"Accordingly, I am going to the world
and to Judaism. Because the Jew is the first
postmodernist, the Jew is the first
globalist."
You really are a
globalist now. You really are going out to the
world. You have taken a French passport, and as
a French citizen you voted in the French
presidential
elections.
"I have
already declared: I am a citizen of the world.
This is my hierarchy of identities: citizen of
the world, afterward Jew and only after that
Israeli. I feel a weighty responsibility for the
peace of the world. And Sarkozy is in my eyes a
threat to world peace. That is why I went to
vote against him."
Are you
French?
"In many
senses I am European. And from my point of view,
Israel is part of
Europe."

But it isn't. Not yet.
And you are an Israeli public figure who is
taking part in the French presidential elections
as a Frenchman. That is a far-reaching act. A
pre-Zionist Jewish act. Something that neither
an Englishman or a Dutchman would
do.
"True. It is completely
Jewish. I am moving forward to the Jewish
condition."
Do you recommend that
every Israeli take out a foreign
passport?
"Whoever
can."
But in
this, in this too, you are dismantling the
Israeli mutual surety. You are playing with your
multiple passports and your multiple identities,
which is a course not available to many others.
You are dismantling something very
basic.
"Those are your fears, Ari.
I suggest that you not be afraid. That is what I
say in the book. I propose that we stop being
afraid."
But you are not only the
book, Avrum. You are also the person outside the
book. And there is a contradiction between the
purism of the man who wrote the book and the
political life you lived
here.
"A terrible
question. Terrible. And it's true. For some of
those years I lived a lie. For many years I was
not myself. At the outset of my political path I
had the energy of the struggle for religion and
state and the struggle for peace. I had the
precise wind of [the late Prof. Yeshayahu]
Leibowitz in my sails. Those were my years of
honesty. That was me. But afterward, for long
years I was a Mapainik [Mapai, forerunner of the
Labor Party]. I was there just to be. And I
was no longer me. I was false to the
tenets."
And
now that you are free of the limitations of
politics, you are going all the way with the
Leibowitz in you. You describe the targeted
assassinations as acts of murder. You are happy
that your mother's grandson is not a fighter
pilot who kills innocent people. You describe
the occupation as an Israeli Anschluss. An
Israeli Anschluss?
"That is what
we are doing there. What do you want me to say
about what we are doing there? That it's
humanism? The Red Cross?"
And the targeted
assassinations are murder?
"Some
of them, certainly."
We are being dragged into
carrying out war crimes?
"I have
no other way to see it. Especially if there is
no horizon of dialogue. The Israelis are very
calm. One more Arab, one less Arab. Ya'allah,
it's alright. But in the end, the pile grows
high. The number of innocent people is so large
that it can no longer be contained. And then our
explosion and their explosion and the world's
will be infinite. I see it happening before my
eyes. I see the pile of Palestinian bodies
crossing the wall we erected so as not to see
it."
And you
are not only Leibowitz. You are also Gandhi. You
say that the right reaction to the Holocaust was
not Anielewicz [Mordechai Anielewicz,
commander of the Warsaw Ghetto
Uprising] but Gandhi.
"I believe
in the doctrine of nonviolence. I do not think
that to believe in nonviolence is to be a patsy.
In my eyes, Gandhi is as Jewish as there
is. He embodies a very ancient Jewish
approach. Like Yochanan ben Zakkai, who asked
for Yavneh and its sages. Not Jerusalem, not the
Temple, not
sovereignty: Yavneh and its
sages."
And
your Gandhiist approach has a political
expression: You believe Israel
should be relieved of nuclear
weapons.
"Of course, of course.
The day the Bomb is dismantled will be the most
important day in Israel's
history. It will be the day on which we get such
a good deal with the other side that we will no
longer need the Bomb. That has to be our
ambition."

Avrum, your book is that
of a man of peace. Almost a pacifist. How did it
happen that when a man of peace like you left
politics you tried to buy from the government a
factory that manufactures tank parts?

"I am a businessman. I deal with
companies. With bringing them back to health.
Privatizations. I like this job and I am also
good at it. One of my main projects was Ashot
Industries in Ashkelon, 40 percent of
which manufactures arms. My intention was to
close down that production line and expand
Ashot's involvement in the world of civil
aviation. I will not be responsible for
manufacturing arms for one day. The challenge I
saw was to take a place that makes spears and
beat them into plowshares."
That deal raised serious
questions. It led to an investigation by the
state comptroller and by the police. But I don't
want to ask about its criminal aspect, because
the case was closed and you were exonerated. I
want to ask how it can be that the first thing a
politician who presented himself as an
anti-Thatcherite and as a sworn enemy of
privatization did after leaving politics was to
try to earn a huge personal profit from
privatization.
"I set out to do
the most anti-Thatcherite thing. The state sold
badly but I wanted to buy well. The state
wronged the workers and I wanted to ensure their
rights. I wanted to show a different model of
partnership between employees and owners. So I
think it is unjust that the State of Israel took
this deal away from me. When I left politics,
the temptations were great. I could have sat on
this board or that board. People wanted me to
open doors and close doors. But I said no. I
went to the old [type of] industry. To the
periphery. I am now producing corn in Hatzor
Haglilit. Show me another person like me who
emerged from politics and is doing work like
this. I am not sitting in Kiryat Atidim [a
high-tech industrial zone]. I am not sitting in
the slick places. I am sweating my guts out
every month to pay my 600 employees. Their
salary."
It's
not exactly right that you decided not to open
doors or close doors. In your joint venture with
businessman David Appel you were supposed to
open doors so he could reincarnate the
'Greek
Island'
tourist project in southern Italy.
"Nothing
came of that project. Not even a business
opportunity. But if something had come of it -
so what? Because 20 people don't like David he
is unacceptable? Because terrible things are
said about him in the judicial system but
nothing is proved? That is violence I cannot
tolerate. It is simply an executioner's
approach. Israeliness as executioner, and we
really love it - it sells papers."
Are the allegations
against you concerning Ashot Industries and
David Appel part of an Israeli executioner's
approach?
"There is a gallows
society here. First we'll hang you and when you
breathe your last breath we will clarify why it
was your last. How it left your body. We are now
living in the equivalent of the 1950s in
America.
In a McCarthyite era. The assault on
corruption is McCarthyism. It is important that
we set boundaries. In the past we swiped things
from the chicken coop, and today that is
impossible. Once we asked girls, When you say
no, what do you mean? - and today sexual
harassment is forbidden. But the way it is being
done - the style, the vulgarity, the populism,
the superficiality. The inability of those who
are under attack to fight back
properly."
You do know how to fight
back. For example, Salai Meridor [former Jewish
Agency chairman] decides that there is no
justification for him and you to enjoy the
baseless privilege of a service car with a
chauffeur for life, and you go to court to fight
for that privilege with all your
might.
"As a former chairman of
the Jewish Agency, I have pension rights just as
you have pension rights. One day they are
suddenly gone. Out of the blue. Think that part
of your pension is to receive Haaretz free and
one day Amos Schocken [the publisher] suddenly
takes it away. Wouldn't you fight? Wouldn't you
go to the workers' committee?
"But every
person is allowed to fight when something is
taken from him - only Avrum is not allowed. Why?
Because. This whole thing is such a pittance in
money terms that it doesn't even exist. But the
level of principle sent me up the
wall."

We're talking about
NIS 200,000.
And about your behavior, which the judge found
disgraceful. And about the fact that even though
you talk high and mighty about morals, you don't
see the moral flaw in the fact that 10 years
after leaving the Jewish Agency you are driving
on your business trips throughout the country
with a Jewish Agency chauffeur driving you
everywhere. On top of which, today you are so
alienated from everything the Jewish Agency
stands for.
"I have something to
say about what the judge said. But I will not
counterattack. I will not correct violence with
violence. We are talking about a person's basic
right. About a pension right."
Was it worth it? What
will remain engraved in people's memory is that
Salai Meridor was fair and modest, and Avrum
Burg was a hedonist who coveted
benefits.
"What remains of all
this is that I am at peace with myself. Everyone
who feels good with secret violence or hidden
knifing or with being an open or covert
Sicarius [name given to Second Temple
Jews who used a dagger, sicarius, to dispose of
collaborators with Rome] - good luck to him!
Well and good. I am not going to educate the
world. What's important for me is that I am at
harmony with myself."
But there is a question
mark here which has accompanied you all along.
You speak so impressively. Not only articulately
but morally. And now you have written a book
that is all morality. But your activity in the
world is different. In political life you were
sophisticated, cagy and snakelike, and in the
business world, too, you are far from being a
saint. The disparity between your language
and your deeds is
disturbing.
"The disparity is
in the eye of the beholder. I do not ask myself
how Ari Shavit sees me. I am finished with the
world in which I care what you think of me. I
live in a world in which I care what I think
about me. For many years I lived with the Moloch
of what people would say. That Moloch led me to
wrong places. To places of a very large gap
between the inner me and the outer me. Today
I live with my truth."
Maybe the things connect.
You really are a man of peace who rejects the
militarist, nationalist, brute-force Israeli.
But when you reconnect to the Jew, you are
connecting not only to the spiritual Jew but
also to the Jew of money.
"True.
Life is not just to be a pioneer with a hoe and
a bold fighter at Lion's Gate. Life is also to
be a merchant in Warsaw.
Unequivocally, that is a richer totality in
life."
Still,
you haven't given up the political. You are a
close friend of Prime Minister Olmert. Do you
continue to support him even after the Second
Lebanon
War?
"The story of Ehud Olmert is
a terribly great tragedy. Of everyone in the
generation that is slightly older than me, he is
the most talented. The most experienced. There
is a great fondness between us. I like him very
much. He is one of the most humane people and
most moral people in regard to relations between
people, and in terms of his relations with his
family. But his ability to translate into
practical terms what he has is impossible
because of the declaration of the war. The
Bush-like notion that war is the first option is
a mistake that colors all of Olmert's other
essential qualities. I still pray that he will
correct this by means of a great political
drama. Hamas or Syria
or the Saudi initiative. I tell him not to
entrench himself in the mistake. It is still
possible for a great healing to come out of the
blunder."
Who
do you support in the Labor Party
primaries?
"Barak."
Why?
"He
has already proved once that he is ready to
go beyond the Israeli Rubicon. And there
will be Rubicons to cross here. His ability to
do that is very important to me."
Do you see yourself
returning to politics?
"An open
question. Only in 2010 will a new political era
begin in Israel.
After the Olmert-Barak-Bibi [Netanyahu]
generation comes to its end, the turn will come
of a new generation who will come from the
economy, the academy, the arts. Maybe then there
will be a place for me."
A place in the Prime
Minister's Bureau?
"Once I wanted
very much to be prime minister. It burned like
fire in my bones. I didn't know what I wanted to
do there, but I wanted terribly to be there.
Today I say that I have lot of marathons to run
before that can happen."
But you are in the
marathon?
"All my
life."

القط الأسود /
إدجار آلان بو
لست أتوقع
منكم، بل لست أطلب أن تصدقوا الوقائع التي أسطرها
هنا لقصة هي أغرب القصص وإن كانت في الآن عينه
مألوفة للغاية.
سوف أكون مجنوناً لو توقعت أن
تصدقوا ذلك، لأن حواسي ذاتها ترفض أن تصدق ماشهدته
ولمسته.
غير أنني لست مجنوناً – ومن المؤكد
أنني لا أحلم- وإذ كنت ملاقياً حتفي غداً فلا بد
لي من أن أزيح هذا العبء عن روحي.
ما أرمي إليه
هو أن أبسط أمام العالم، بوضوح ودقة، وبلا أي
تعليق، سلسلة من الوقائع العادية جداً. إنها
الوقائع التي عصفت بي أهوالها و واصلت تعذيبي
ودمرتني. مع ذلك لن أحاول تفسيرها

حـــــــــــــــــــــــــــاءات

جهـــــــاد
عــقــيـــــــل

إلى فاطمة
الناهض

.
كانت المرة الأولى التي
يراها.. يا الله.. قال في سره: بينما سقطت الأوراق
التي يريد أن يستنسخها على سواد الشارع وراح
يرقبها وأحذية السيارات تتما زقها، كان يعلم في
غمرة انشغاله بالذهول بأنهم سيطردونه من عمله: مثل
الكلب ـ كان يحدث نفسه ـ لكنه استنسخ كذلك عبارة
مشوهة: ( مثل إجـْري ) قال ذاك وهو يرقب العصافير
وهي تأتي إليها، هكذا فجأة نبتت في وجهه دون داع
لذلك، لكنه الآن ينسرب كالماء خلف صوت ناعم لبلبل
أو شحرور لم يكن قادرا على أن يميز بين صوتيهما،
ويبدأ الزحف الخشن لحذاء سنواته على بلاط الذاكرة،

عشرون عاما وهو يزحف
كدودة الحلزون يحمل أوراق الناس و معاملاتهم وهي
تأتي مترعة بالآمال على بيت ظهره، بينما تحضنه
الغيوم الصاعدة من أفواههم كل يوم وهو
ينتظر.

.
ما الذي كان
ينتظره طيلة هذه السنوات.

..

.
يتصاعد بخار
السؤال ويتكاثف في أعلى نقطة من رأسه، وان ذلك قد
يجد آلافا من التفاسير والمبررات التي قد تجعله في
مهب رياح قاسية .

.
ورغم الأصوات
الناعبة في مدن رأسه المتاخمة للغبار كان يؤثر
الصمت، بينما يستمر باكتشاف تفاصيل هذه الغواية
التي تقف حائلا الآن بين حياة عاشها بكل هذا السخف
وبين ما قد تجلبه الأيام.

.تساءل وهو يشرق إلى مقعد
تحتضنه الاكاسيا: ياه.

..
كل هذه
السنوات.

.
كانت اللحظات
تهز قلبه كأرجوحة معلقة على شجرة عالية، فيميل
رأسه ويتأرجح وعيناه فيما ذلك تحاصران البهاء
الأخضر وتغلفاه بجفنين من ترهل سني عمره، موسيقى
هائلة كانت تخترق أذنيه وهو يحتضن المشاهد، موسيقى
ناعمة لكنها ليست خافته أبدا ربما قرع الطبول الذي
تناسق مع نبضات قلبه وانين الكمنجات الجريحة وهي
تعبر غبش الذكريات هو ما أوحى له بذلك: ثم يأتي
صوت أنثوي شحيح وسحيق ينسرب من بين بضعة أوتار
لآلات لم يميز فيما بينها الصوت يشحذه كنصل فيطلق
رأسه إلى وهج الشمس دون أن يفتح عينيه مؤثرا سحر
المنظر الذي أطبق عليه.

.
وكأنه انتهى
للتو من تذوق أمتع أطعمة الدنيا يحتفظ بلعاب فمه
حتى لا ينعتق من أسر ذلك المذاق بينما راح الجسد،
يختلج ينتفض وخطوات حزينة تسبقه، تماما كالسائر في
نومه ولن يستطيع مقاومة هذا إلا عندما يرتطم وجهه
بما يبدو لوحا حجريا، تبدأ يداه الآن بتحسس أوردة
هيروغليفية نافرة من جلد الحجر وسط كم هائل من
العيون الجانبية تتقد بالجمر وطول الانتظار الرعشة
التي غلفت يديه أيقظت في روحه همسا دافقا لنسوة
يعبثن بالنهارات فيقطعنها بأحاديثهن الهاربة من
سقم عيشهن الحامض، هسيس ضحكاتهن المكبوتة وغمز
عيونهن جعله يستفيق شيئا فشيئا الآن يعي تماما أن
كل ذلك لم يكن إلا رسما فرعونيا على لوح من حجر
لكن بياض عينيه الذي أنعتق فجأة من ذبابات الأسئلة
وهي تطن، تعلق بالغيوم وهي تركض برشاقة عابرة أنف
كائن مرعب لم يرى ندا له أبدا. .

..
حصان من جمود
بدا واضحا بعد أن ارتعدت خطواته الذبيحة إلى
الوراء حتى يلصق بياض عينيه بسواد البرونز العظيم
وهو يسمق إلى السماء.

..
كائن يشبه
الأحصنة المجنحة على جدران بابل يتحسس مواضع
الصعود.

.
ويحس بنبض
البرونز وهو يجلل يديه بالقوة وبعد أن يتوج صعوده
بالوصول يمسك لجام الحصان بكلتا يديه ويضغط صدره
إلى الأمام، بينما الحصان يفرد جناحيه ويرفع يديه
إلى أعلى وكأنه يتأهب للحظة الطيران لكن من المؤكد
انه لم يفعل ذلك أبدا لأنه ظل تمثالا تحتضنه
الشجيرات في الحديقة العامة وصاحبه ما زال حتى هذه
اللحظة غارقا في ذهول البرونز البارد.

.
جهاد
عقيل .

.
أواخر آب
2006
.

امرأة من برج
الحياة

للقاصة
فاطمة الناهض

كانت تسير
الهوينا؛
وكأنها
ماضية إلى
حتفها،إن حثت الخطى أو أخرتها لن تحدث
فرقا.

أتطفل على
حضورها المضني
يداعب وحشة الامتداد، خلف نافذة غرفة مكيفة في
الطابق الأرضي، لمبنى حكومي قديم.
إدارة منسية منذ زمن،
لا يتكاثر
موظفوها ولا يتناقصون ،لا يتغيرون، ولا
العمل.ولا أنا.

أرقبها
والوهج ينفجر في وجه المحيطات، فتشحب
وتهتز كسراب
بعيد، وتضيع معالمها، ثم تتداخل، فيصعب
تفكيكها.

تسير
الهوينا، كانت.

عباءتها
السوداء التي تمتص شظايا الشمس المتناثرة، وترشق
بها الجسد
النحيل، تميل إلى اللون البني، تشي بأنها اعتادت
السير عكس الشمس مسافات طويلة.
اقتربت من ظل الجدار الذي يسند النافذة، فتنبهت
أنها كانت تنوء بحمل جائر بيدها
اليمنى، كأنه صرة محملة بالهموم، وقد جمعت طرفي
عباءتها عند الذقن، وعضّت عليهما كي لا تنحسر
العباءة عن شعرها الأملس. عروق يدها نافرة مستفزة
كما لو كانت تحاول
الهروب من سجنها الجلدي أو الانفجار.

لم تكن
تتألم، فوجهها صفحة بحر
هادئة، في صباح خريفي دافىء، ولم تكن فتيّه، فقط
ذلك الوجه اللا منسجم مع محيطات
منتصف النهار المشوهة، أوحى بذلك.

أوحى بأنها
في عالم آخر، شديد الطمأنينة،
منفصل عن سياط اللهب المتساقطة على الرأس
والكتفين.

عالم آخر تماما،
فحين اقتربت من الظل، تسلل الىّ قلق مفاجىء غير
مبرر، لكنها نظرت إليّ بحياد
موجع، وكأنني جزء من المبنى الأثري، حياد لا يستحق
أدنى ارتباك، وتابعت سيرها بنفس
السرعة المنتظمة، بعد أن نقلت حملها الثقيل لليد
الأخرى وعضت على عباءتها أكثر،
باعتيادية كالبسملة.

لأقل من
ثانية التقت نظراتنا، تفحصت وجهها، وتيقنت أنها لم
تكن حيث كانت! تجاوزتني، فغامرت بفتح النافذة
وخيول الهجير تركض نحوى،
لألقى نظرة أخيرة عليها، قبل أن تختفي كما نبتت
فجأة، في تلك المساحة الشاسعة
كملعب خرافي لكرة اللهب المعلقة.

لازمتني
صورتها والتصقت بالعمق بما
يشبه السحر!

صار يومض
وجهها كضوء آلة التصوير، بين وجوه المراجعين،
لا علاقة له بشيء ولا بأحد، وبين المارّة الذين
يقطعون الشارع في اللحظة الأخيرة
لإشارة عبور المشاة.

أحيانا
تعيد حملها الثقيل إلى يدها اليمنى وتواجهني
حين انظر في المرآة، أعيد ترتيب الوجه الذي أرتديه
عادة في الصباح.

وعندما
انشطر الظلام إلى نصفين، جربت أن أغفو فتقاطرت
ملامحها الصافية. كالمطر
الحنون، في يوم خلق للذكريات.

فتنت
باليقين الذي داخلني, بأننا نعرف
بعضنا في عالم مواز..متداخل وغامض ..

لكنه فاتن
وساحر.

تسربت
الراحة الخادعة إلى أطرافي، وأوشكت أن
أغفو،
فراحت تتراءى لي
وهى تدبر شؤون منزلها بدقة الساعة وسرعة الاحتراف،
تجلس في زاوية ضيقة تخيط ما
تفتق من ملابس الأولاد! و أرقبها بإعجاب يضاهى
الوله، فما لبثت أن جمعت بيضا من
القن، وخضارا من الحقل وبعض العشب وذهبت للسوق،
وكنت بانتظارها، حين عادت باسمة يضج
وجهها بالسعادة والألق، أعدت الطعام وكانت وحدها.
عادت إلى الحقل وحرثت وبذرت، ثم
عادت، كان الوقت مازال يميل إلى السواد حين توضأت
وصلّت وحلبت البقرة العفية
بمودة وعشرة. وكانت وحدها، عادت وذهبت وذهبت
وعادت، وأنا في مكاني. استرسل في انفعالي
الكاسر وأنا أطل على عالمها السحري،
وأحسد
صبرها وشغفها بتفاصيل
الحياة كمن يحيكها من روحه ،
أردت أن
أغفو لكنها لم تدعني،

كانت تدعوني
ببهجة لم أفهمها، حين تجمََلَت، وأنجبت طفلها
السابع. وكنت أحارب جيوش
النوم والانتباه، وأنا أحاول أن استطلع كنه الوزر
الذي تتهادى به كالبطريق،
في السراب الممتد، وكأنها تؤجل مراسم الدفن. ..إلى
أن سقطت فتلقفني سقف الحلم بيد
من حنان.

وهناك، حيث
القصائد تأخذ شكل النجوم، رأيتها أجمل.

وهبت للريح
عباءتها.. وذراعيها للفضاء.. رأيتها منكبة على
أحابيلها الصغيرة
كحائك دؤوب، والأفق أمامها ممهد بالجسارات،
وأحاديث الوسائد..

كانت امرأة
تتخلص من خيبات القلب عند بوابة الماء.. تعكر صفو
الأنهار برجفة
المثابرة..تكاد حشائش الضفاف تتشبث بأقدامها
المتعبة في زرقة المساء.. وهى تركض في
الحقول كخيط من البارود المشتعل..خلف آخر قاتليها،
وحين تشق رائحة النار قميصه
المطرز بالجبن والدسائس.. يصرخ وهو يتدحرج تحت
أذيالها:الرحمة! ..ولا تمهله أكثر من
الدهشة.. وتتابع انسيابها نحو الماء على مهل.. وهى
تنضو عن عنقها قلائد الحزن
والكآبة.

ولم يكن ذلك
آخر عهدي بها.. أبدا.

فاطمة
الناهض..

26/5/2006

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