From Oslo to Iraq and the Road Map
Essays
-
- $12.99
-
- $12.99
Publisher Description
In his final book, completed just before his death, Edward W. Said offers impassioned pleas for the beleaguered Palestinian cause from one of its most eloquent spokesmen. These essays, which originally appeared in Cairo’s Al-Ahram Weekly, London’s Al-Hayat, and the London Review of Books, take us from the Oslo Accords through the U.S. led invasion of Iraq, and present information and perspectives too rarely visible in America.Said is unyielding in his call for truth and justice. He insists on truth about Israel's role as occupier and its treatment of the Palestinians. He pleads for new avenues of communication between progressive elements in Israel and Palestine. And he is equally forceful in his condemnation of Arab failures and the need for real leadership in the Arab world.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In the three years before he died of leukemia in September 2003, noted critic and commentator Said (Culture and Imperialism, etc.) observed with sputtering rage some of the grimmest moments in the tragic history of the Middle East conflict. The commentaries collected here, written mostly for two Arabic-language publications, are caustic and heartbroken, heaping scorn on the "demonic" Ariel Sharon, but reserving plenty of contempt for the "ruinous regime" of Yasir Arafat. Said has few allies in his call for Palestinians and Israelis to unite in a single binational state, but his critique of Oslo's approach to a two-state solution has come to seem prescient. He denounces suicide bombing, advising Palestinians instead to "seize the moral high ground" and build a civil society, but he insists that Israel's occupation, settlements and counterterrorist reprisals are primarily responsible for the conflict. After September 11, Said worries about the "Israelization of U.S. policy." But regarding Iraq, Said, who opposed Hussein's rule as well as the sanctions policy and the American invasion, doesn't suggest an alternative. He often criticizes all of the messy options available to policy makers, placing his hopes in nonviolent resistance movements that don't yet exist. Still, these essays are a reminder of what has been lost: a passionate and eloquent spokesman for the aspirations of progressives in the Arab world.
