“Today, anyone who continues to talk about peace in Israel is condemned as a fool and a naive person.” A little over a decade ago, at the end of 2013, the Israeli writer Nir Baram (Jerusalem, 1976) visited Barcelona to present The Good People, an international success with which the then young novelist had become known. Cultura/s spoke with him and contacted him again, now via email, when he had just published At the end of the night (Alfaguara). Critical then and now of his country’s politics from a radical left, these ten years have changed many things, in his personal life and in the region, with Hamas and Israel at war. Baram is not optimistic about the future.
Ten years is an eternity in the Middle East.
In the last ten years, Israel has become more conservative, and so has Jerusalem, my city and where my novel is set. We have seen it, hopes for peace collapsed, the country has moved to the right. In Jerusalem there are still places where you can see Jews and Arabs living together, sitting in the same cafes and buying things in the same stores. That was always part of life in Jerusalem and still is, but Israel in general became more right-wing.
The protagonists of his new book, also belonging to his same generation, talk about reaching an agreement with the Arabs, traveling to their countries, it seemed imminent. Is it possible to continue having hope?
Nowadays it is very difficult to continue talking about hope. Yonathan and Yoel are in their youth in the nineties, when dreams were possible and the wind of peace seemed eternal. Now a lot of time has passed and those years are far away. One could continue hoping, but it is very difficult to keep faith when you see that in the last twenty years we stopped seeking peace and simply want tranquility, well, we cannot have tranquility without peace.
Is the two-state solution still possible?
I really don’t see how we can completely separate Jews and Palestinians. Both are mixed in a way that is very difficult to disintegrate. The only plan I can see is some form of a single, democratic state, in which everyone has the right to vote; It could be a land of two peoples with open borders and free movement for all. The two-state solution, as we know it, seems impossible to implement to me. I support it, but I think we are closer to a one-state solution.
How will this war affect the youngest? There is a distrust of Palestinians on the one hand and a hatred of Jews on the other. How will these generations grow?
Unfortunately, they will grow up distrusting and hating each other. I think it’s inevitable. Young Jews and young Palestinians do not meet in the same spaces and do not know each other. When you don’t know a person or an entire nation, it is easy to hate and distrust. They know each other only as enemies and nothing more. That’s a big problem when you think about the conflict, that the younger generations have never had the slightest relationship with each other, they have never talked, they have never learned to listen to each other, and they don’t see the other side as a complete human being with desires and aspirations.
After the Hamas attacks of October 7, a group of Israeli intellectuals, including David Grossman and Yuval Noah Harari, accused the Western left of insensitivity toward that country’s victims.
I agree that in this case the Western left minimized those events and did not put enough focus on the crimes that Hamas committed that day. Hamas’ crimes were what led to this war and not the Israeli hunger for more territory or all kinds of different ideas. But in the same way I think we must now also be aware of the suffering in Gaza and end the war as soon as possible.
Do you maintain your personal relationship with Palestinian writers despite the war?
Yes, it is possible to have a friendship. I still keep in touch with my Arab friends. Some of them are writers and poets. I think we should be aware of the fact that having an Israeli friend is a problem for them, from their point of view. But it is very important to always remember that we are talking about human beings and these friendships always help you keep that in mind.
Nir Baram At the End of the Night Alfaguara Translation by Ayeleth Nirpaz 344 pages 20.80 euros
