Apeirogon

Fifth Tuesday after Pentecost

First, let me say congratulations to our son John on his 50th birthday. Looking forward to our birthday dinner at our house tonight.

Second, thanks to Jerry, Joe, and Vicki C. for their comments. I'll respond to Jerry's comments on Friday. 

Tuesday is review day. Today I'm reviewing a superb new novel by Colum McCann, Apeirogon. The novel is based on the real lives of two present day men, Bassam Aramin, a Palestinian, and Rami Elhanan, an Israeli. Bassam is a Muslim; Rami, a Jew. Though on opposite sides of brutal international conflict, they end up becoming friends through their participation in the birthing of an organization called "Combatants for Peace." Members of the organization have been combatants in one or more of the wars or conflicts between Israelis and Arabs. 

Both men have had beloved daughters killed in the struggle. Bassam's daughter Abir was shot in the head with a rubber bullet by a passing Israeli soldier in a jeep. She was 10, riding her bicycle to a candy store to buy a treat. The Israeli soldier was never arrested or tried.  He said it was self defense. Bassam eventually won a civil suit.

Rami's daughter Smadar was killed at age 15 in a suicide bombing by three Hezbollah Palestinian terrorists on Ben Yehuda street in Jerusalem. 

Bassam had spent seven years in an Israeli jail for throwing a rock  when he was a teenager at an Israeli soldier. Rami had fought in the Israeli army in the 1983 Yom Kippur War. He was captured and held in captivity by Hezbollah for many months. Both men had been tortured. Both men were haunted by the loss of their daughters. Both men were tired of and disgusted with war and violence. Both men are able to tell true and compelling stories of their daughters lives and their own.

Through the Combatants for Peace organization they go on speaking tours, at first in Israel and Palestine, but eventually all over Europe and North America. Having their stories heard brings them some ray of hope for a future of peace. 

That's the basic plot of the book, but there is so, so very much more. McCann's writing style is different from anything I've read before. The chapters are short, anywhere from five pages to two words. Some of the one sentence chapters can convey immense power and feeling. Others convey odd bits of information, always interesting but not always of immediate relevance to the story. The chapters go from 1 to 501, then  descend to 500, 499, and all the way back to one. It has not gone unnoticed by critics that total number of chapters is the same as the number of stories that Scheherazade tells in the the classic A Thousand and One Arabian Nights. McCann's literary style is crisp, clean. Sentences are brief. Things move fast. 

McCann treats the two sides of the conflict fairly, but fairly does not mean that both sides are equally guilty or equally innocent. The Israelis are military occupiers of  Palestinian land, the West Bank and Gaza. The Israelis have the power. And they use it. They use it in day to day insults, bullying, denying access to places by stopping and holding cars or people for hours. Two of my students witnessed Israeli soldiers ramming the butts of their rifles into the butts of Palestinian men standing at urinals in a public restroom. It's everyday abuse.  Israelis control utilities and charge four to five times as much for Palestinians as for Israelis. Israeli soldiers with their Uzi machine guns are everywhere, most of them 18-21. Their effect is constant oppression. Israelis are brought up to oppress. Palestinians are brought up to hate. Yet through it all much basic human decency shines. Care, concern, and even love can cross borders. The ultimate objective of both men is what Arabs call salim, Israelis call shalom, and we call peace.

You can't read the book without seeing parallels to the historic treatment of African-Americans in the United States, although that is never mentioned in the book. The book is so much more than I can convey in this review. I recommend it highly.

Incidentally, an "Apeirogon" is a polygon with an infinite number of countable sides. They may not be possible, but it is indicative of the complexity of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Faithfully,

Christian