I have seen for the first time in 100 years of conflict, the two peoples - the Israeli people and the Palestinian people - are ahead of their leaderships.
Interpretation
This quote expresses hope that the desire for peace and understanding among people can surpass the divides created by leadership.
Amos Oz highlights a significant shift in the dynamic between Israelis and Palestinians, suggesting that the general populace of both groups may be ready for peace and reconciliation, regardless of the often rigid and conflict-driven views of their political leaders. This implies a potential for grassroots movements to bring about change, transcending historical animosities nurtured by political agendas.
In practice
In a speech about reconciliation efforts between different ethnic groups.
When I was little, my ambition was to grow up to be a book. Not a writer. People can be killed like ants. Writers are not hard to kill either. But not books: however systematically you try to destroy them, there is always a chance that a copy will survive and continue to enjoy a shelf-life in some corner on an out-of-the-way library somehwere in Reykjavik, Valladolid or Vancouver.
Two children of same cruel parent look at one another and see in each other the image of the cruel parent or the image of their past oppressor. This is very much the case between Jew and Arab: It's a conflict between two victims.
If we don't stop somewhere, if we don't accept an unhappy compromise, unhappy for both sides, if we don't learn how to unhappily coexist and contain our burned sense of injustice - if we don't learn how to do that, we end up in a doomed state.
Fundamentalist s live life with an exclamation point. I prefer to live my life with a question mark.
Writing a poem is like having an affair, a one-night stand; a short story is a romance, a relationship; a novel is a marriage-one has to be cunning, devise compromises, and make sacrifices.
She had not wanted him to but had let him have his way because ever since she was a child she had generally yielded before anyone with strong willpower, especially if it was a man, not because she was naturally submissive, but because strong male willpower gave her a feeling of safety and trust, together with acceptance and a desire to give in.
Until white people understand that racism is embedded in everything, including our consciousness and socialisation, then we cannot go forward.
Unless there's a personal transformation, there can be no social transformation.
If we are going to realise our ambition of ending the harmful practices of FGM and forced marriage, the role of young people in pushing for change is crucial. We also need to ensure that everyone, from government to civil society, is playing their part.
If there had been no troublemakers, no Dissenters, we should still be living in caves.
A significant portion of the earth's population will soon recognize, if they haven't already done so, that humanity is now faced with a stark choice: Evolve or die.
Are you going to cater to the whims and prejudices of people? We draw out from other people our own thought. If, when you go out to organize, you go with a broad spirit, you will create and call out breadth and toleration. You had better organize one woman on a broad platform than 10,000 on a narrow platform of intolerance and bigotry.
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