Truth and Reconciliation

Will there ever be a Truth and Reconciliation Commission for Israel and Gaza? Will a charismatic Nelson Mandela arise from the ashes? Will a Marshall Plan rebuild the devastation? Is there ever too much bloodshed fur forgiveness? Look at Hiroshima or Dresden. Vergangensheitsbewaltigung is German for "the burden of the past." Will the Serbs and Bosnians, the Tutsis and Hutus and for that matter the Hindus and Muslims of Indian and Pakistan ever achieve anything beyond detente?  A one-state solution is what's fair, but can parity be achieved? Or will the tinderbox explode. Israel has never been more isolated. Yet the mood in the traumatized country is more militant than ever and remember Israel has 90 nuclear bombs. Any religious state is like those Buddhists monks who set themselves on fire. It's a license for apocalypse.

Listen to Joan Baum's review of The Kafka Studies Department by Francis Levy on NPR

and read Mark Segal on Hallie Cohen's "Mi Ricordo: Roman Watercolors" show in The East Hampton Star