THE THINKING HEART

The noted Israeli novelist ponders the state of his corner of the world after Oct. 7, 2023.

Make no mistake, urges Grossman, the author of To the End of the Land and other novels: Israel is in a state of war, and “If I may hazard a guess: Israel after the war will be much more right-wing, militant, and racist.” This, says Grossman, is an unfortunate but logical outcome of Benjamin Netanyahu’s intransigent view that Israel is alone in the world and that he’s the only one who can save the nation—unfortunate, Grossman notes, because, in his view, “we will probably not be able to win the next war on our own.” That next war may involve Hamas, Hezbollah, the Islamic State, and the Yemeni Houthis, who are already enemies singly but who may decide to act in concert. “Even the IDF [the Israel Defense Forces] will not be able to withstand a simultaneous attack by several states—including Iran—on several fronts.” Israelis sense this, Grossman suggests, to the extent that the national mood has gone from confidence to “fragility and anxiety,” at least in part because the sense that the nation is fundamentally united is also gone: Leftists and rightists “view one another as an actual existential threat.” The fault for the conflict is not Israel’s alone, Grossman urges, but the opportunity to lead a movement for peace among neighbors lies there, in a state committed to some sort of national solution for Palestine rather than one willing to accommodate the present system of repression and “a total denial of reality.” This brief collection of occasional pieces never arrives at a fully developed thesis for solving the region’s present maladies, but it is both suggestive and provocative, especially in Grossman’s view that giving in to cynicism and apathy will lead to the obvious: “a short path to religious fanaticism, nationalism, fascism.”

An urgent appeal for peace in a time of growing war.