イスラエル／パレスチナ和平

Arafat himself laid out the alternative course in an interview he gave in 1990. "Politics," hi explained, "remain[s] the art of the possible and must not be based on the spirit's preferences and chimerical dreams." If Arafat had followed that advice, the history of the Middle East and indeed of the world would have been a much happier and ultimately a more just one for all concerned.
This was the ultimate irony of his life: Arafat, the man whod did more than anyone else to champion and advance the Palestinian cause, also inflicted years of unnecessary suffering on his people, delaying any beneficial redress of their grievances or solutions to their problems.

http://www.amazon.co.jp/exec/obidos/ASIN/0195166892/ref=sr_aps_eb_1/249-6501433-2033917

Yasir Arafat: A Political Biography
Barry Rubin (著), Judith Colp Rubin (著)



随分前にRubinが著述中、として紹介した本がすでに入手可能になっています。

上記に引用したのは、この本の最後の文章。その最終章のタイトルは「No End to the Struggle」でした。表紙のアラファトの写真を見ながらその小タイトルを読むだけでも、僕には充分にユダヤ式「ユーモア」のセンスが伝わってくる。また、そういう視点、距離感がなければとてもパレスチナ人についての本は、まともな「人間」には読み切れるものでもない、と思う。

以下は本の裏表紙に掲載されている書評のひとつ。

"A superb and weighty account of the complexities of the Palestinian problem and the significant impediments to state building....Rubin covers in rich and penetrateing detail... the rising expectations of a long-suffering and dispossessed people." - Washington Post