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The Slopes Of Lebanon
Essays deal with Jewish-Arab relations, the concept of trading land for peace, the Holocaust, and the controversy surrounding Austrian president Kurt Waldheim
240 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1987
10 people are currently reading
140 people want to read
About the author
Amos Oz
191 books1,654 followersAmos Oz (Hebrew: עמוס עוז; born Amos Klausner) was an Israeli writer, novelist, journalist and intellectual. He was also a professor of literature at Ben-Gurion University in Beersheba. He was regarded as Israel's most famous living author.
Oz's work has been published in 42 languages in 43 countries, and has received many honours and awards, among them the Legion of Honour of France, the Goethe Prize, the Prince of Asturias Award in Literature, the Heinrich Heine Prize and the Israel Prize. In 2007, a selection from the Chinese translation of A Tale of Love and Darkness was the first work of modern Hebrew literature to appear in an official Chinese textbook.
Since 1967, Oz had been a prominent advocate of a two-state solution to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict.
Oz's work has been published in 42 languages in 43 countries, and has received many honours and awards, among them the Legion of Honour of France, the Goethe Prize, the Prince of Asturias Award in Literature, the Heinrich Heine Prize and the Israel Prize. In 2007, a selection from the Chinese translation of A Tale of Love and Darkness was the first work of modern Hebrew literature to appear in an official Chinese textbook.
Since 1967, Oz had been a prominent advocate of a two-state solution to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
May 3, 2020
“But the past is also a stagnating force…”
“I have tried to replace my alienation of those days with various kinds of involvement, engagements, petitions, and public stands.”
“For instance, there is an abyss that divides the nonnationalist ultra-Orthodox zealots from ultra-nationalist Orthodox zealots.”
“What divides Israel, within itself, today?
Some say the issue at the heart of the controversy is the question of desirable and feasible borders. Others contend that Israel today daces a rebellion of Sephardim – primarily those from North Africa – against the hegemony of Ashkenazim, whose roots are in Eastern Europe. Still others point to the widening gap between religious and secular Jews as the focus of the internal struggle. Some note a contradiction between a welfare-state ideology, on the one hand, and an acquisitive, egotistic mentality, or between an increasing loss of human feelings and a growing nationalist emotionalism.
All of these divisions do exist. Israel is not split down the middle on two sides of one single divide. It is split up by lines that intersect one another at various points.
Foreign journalists, for their own convenience, sometimes tend to simplify the picture and to arrange it along a single barricade. It is easier to report to their readers on a Jewish West Bank settler who is, at the same time, a deprived Sephardi and a religious zealot, or, by way of contradistinction, on an educates, secular Ashkenazi Jew who favors compromise with the Arabs and the protection of individual rights. To their dismay and to our good fortune, the reality is not that simple. The vast majority of the Jewish settlers in the West Bank are Ashkenazim, not Sephardim. The most extreme religious zealots do not live in the West Bank and are not the spearheads of hawkish positions. Most Sephardi Jews do not observe the Jewish religious laws. The left is not composed only of workers, and the right is more populist than capitalist.”
“The terrorist plot to blow up Arab passenger buses and to murder, in cold blood, dozens or even hundreds of men, women, and children confirms the dreadful suspicion that has haunted the public at least since the attempted assassination of West Bank mayors and the murder at the Islamic College in Hebron: Yes, there is a Jewish terrorist organization.“
“The addiction to memory has debilitated the addict.”
“I have tried to replace my alienation of those days with various kinds of involvement, engagements, petitions, and public stands.”
“For instance, there is an abyss that divides the nonnationalist ultra-Orthodox zealots from ultra-nationalist Orthodox zealots.”
“What divides Israel, within itself, today?
Some say the issue at the heart of the controversy is the question of desirable and feasible borders. Others contend that Israel today daces a rebellion of Sephardim – primarily those from North Africa – against the hegemony of Ashkenazim, whose roots are in Eastern Europe. Still others point to the widening gap between religious and secular Jews as the focus of the internal struggle. Some note a contradiction between a welfare-state ideology, on the one hand, and an acquisitive, egotistic mentality, or between an increasing loss of human feelings and a growing nationalist emotionalism.
All of these divisions do exist. Israel is not split down the middle on two sides of one single divide. It is split up by lines that intersect one another at various points.
Foreign journalists, for their own convenience, sometimes tend to simplify the picture and to arrange it along a single barricade. It is easier to report to their readers on a Jewish West Bank settler who is, at the same time, a deprived Sephardi and a religious zealot, or, by way of contradistinction, on an educates, secular Ashkenazi Jew who favors compromise with the Arabs and the protection of individual rights. To their dismay and to our good fortune, the reality is not that simple. The vast majority of the Jewish settlers in the West Bank are Ashkenazim, not Sephardim. The most extreme religious zealots do not live in the West Bank and are not the spearheads of hawkish positions. Most Sephardi Jews do not observe the Jewish religious laws. The left is not composed only of workers, and the right is more populist than capitalist.”
“The terrorist plot to blow up Arab passenger buses and to murder, in cold blood, dozens or even hundreds of men, women, and children confirms the dreadful suspicion that has haunted the public at least since the attempted assassination of West Bank mayors and the murder at the Islamic College in Hebron: Yes, there is a Jewish terrorist organization.“
“The addiction to memory has debilitated the addict.”
Read
July 4, 2012Clearly a book that captures the disgust of Oz as his homeland acts with impunity against her northern neighbors. Disappointment drips from every Page.
November 1, 2007
The Lebanon war in Israel during the eighties has an eerily similar history to the Iraq war of present. Specifically the way the public is affected, or more precisely how the American public is not affected by the war in any real way (i.e. sacrifice). The Israel government at the time was doing very similar things to the Bush administration (calling the war pre-emptive, striking first, creating more problems during and after then were there before the conflict)
December 12, 2013
Well written and educational. A very thought-provoking book about the modern state of Israel. Worth a read.
December 18, 2016
Essays published in 1986 with messages still meaningful in 2016. One sentence jumped out at me which I think we all need to follow: "We must treat words like hand grenades"
December 16, 2023
I'm starting to think this Oz guy is a good writer or something.
But seriously, even though most of this book was just opinion articles on various themes, they were also interesting essays on morality, hatred, prejudice, history, memory, and Oz's searing hatred for Austria. There are three or four that I'll probably come back to.
That isn't even getting into this book as a time capsule- it's easy to forget how people thought about things in a different time period, and Oz recorded how the Israeli left viewed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the 1980s. The differences from now are pretty vast- I don't think he'd really read or reckoned too much with the work of the New Historians, and didn't really seem to understand Israels role in expelling the Palestinians in 1948. He never even mentioned it once, as far as I remember.
But seriously, even though most of this book was just opinion articles on various themes, they were also interesting essays on morality, hatred, prejudice, history, memory, and Oz's searing hatred for Austria. There are three or four that I'll probably come back to.
That isn't even getting into this book as a time capsule- it's easy to forget how people thought about things in a different time period, and Oz recorded how the Israeli left viewed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the 1980s. The differences from now are pretty vast- I don't think he'd really read or reckoned too much with the work of the New Historians, and didn't really seem to understand Israels role in expelling the Palestinians in 1948. He never even mentioned it once, as far as I remember.
August 20, 2019
I don't think I've ever read another writer on Israel who so thoroughly reflects my political views. It is heartbreaking to read these editorials 30 years in retrospect, knowing what he and his generation might have saved, and how things might have turned out differently. I haven't read any of Oz's more contemporary reflections, but I can't imagine he likes the direction of the country these days.
Though the early chapters are repetitive in their criticism of the war in Lebanon, but the later chapters - about the diversity of opinions within the Jewish state and their many hypocrisies - really stuck with me. Oz's breakdown ought to be a required primer for anyone visiting Israel. So much of these divisions still hold true today, and I wonder if many of us might recognize ourselves there.
Though the early chapters are repetitive in their criticism of the war in Lebanon, but the later chapters - about the diversity of opinions within the Jewish state and their many hypocrisies - really stuck with me. Oz's breakdown ought to be a required primer for anyone visiting Israel. So much of these divisions still hold true today, and I wonder if many of us might recognize ourselves there.
September 17, 2019
look forward to reading much more by amos oz. the essays in this book were thoughtful, provocative, informative, on the moral issues facing the citizens of the state of israel.
Read
February 17, 2023I couldn't get into this nonfiction one by my beloved-- very rambling, with no breathing space reserved within the narrative to let concepts absorb.
Read
May 18, 2025Had a hard time finishing the book. Had to put it down for now. I’m the meantime I’ve read another book of his.
June 30, 2023
The sheer irony in that a “Left Zionist” is one whose beliefs are that Israel should abide by international law, as if that is some kind of revolutionary statement to make or that it is a noble courageous stance to carry. Amos Oz is not a leftist, he is a leftist Zionist which makes him a rightist but more on the left side.
It is palpable that Zionism can only be a rightist movement. This can be seen in the most Zionist government to date - a government led by terrorists and fanatics such as the likes of Ben Gvir, Smotritch, and Netanyahu.
At its very roots, Zionism is a colonialist ideology, it started a such, and it is as such. The only true solution can come about when Israelis recognize Palestinians as equals, as a people that have as much of as right to the land from the River to the Sea. Palestinians have lived on the land for hundreds of years, whether they were called Arabs or Palestinians is irrelevant, effectively, their displacement of their land, the demolishing of their villages and towns, the massacres that happened, those were the events that marked the establishment of an Israeli state. All of these events during Al-Nakba represent a historical fact accepted almost undisputedly by the academic world, and an event that was further outlawed in the Knesset, reflecting the inherent fascist ideology of the government.
Al-Nakba gives Palestinian the legal and moral right from the River to the Sea, and as long as Zionists do not recognize that Palestinians have that right, and that they are not inferiors and that Israelis are not superiors, only then than equality and peace can be achieved. The biggest barrier to this is of course that Israelis want to maintain a “more equal” Jewish majority that dominates over both Palestinians in Israel, and Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
The idea that just because someone recognizes that Palestinians deserve to live normally and not under occupation, that the West Bank should not be colonized, the Palestinians should be able to move freely, then that is a “Leftist” is a mockery.
It is palpable that Zionism can only be a rightist movement. This can be seen in the most Zionist government to date - a government led by terrorists and fanatics such as the likes of Ben Gvir, Smotritch, and Netanyahu.
At its very roots, Zionism is a colonialist ideology, it started a such, and it is as such. The only true solution can come about when Israelis recognize Palestinians as equals, as a people that have as much of as right to the land from the River to the Sea. Palestinians have lived on the land for hundreds of years, whether they were called Arabs or Palestinians is irrelevant, effectively, their displacement of their land, the demolishing of their villages and towns, the massacres that happened, those were the events that marked the establishment of an Israeli state. All of these events during Al-Nakba represent a historical fact accepted almost undisputedly by the academic world, and an event that was further outlawed in the Knesset, reflecting the inherent fascist ideology of the government.
Al-Nakba gives Palestinian the legal and moral right from the River to the Sea, and as long as Zionists do not recognize that Palestinians have that right, and that they are not inferiors and that Israelis are not superiors, only then than equality and peace can be achieved. The biggest barrier to this is of course that Israelis want to maintain a “more equal” Jewish majority that dominates over both Palestinians in Israel, and Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
The idea that just because someone recognizes that Palestinians deserve to live normally and not under occupation, that the West Bank should not be colonized, the Palestinians should be able to move freely, then that is a “Leftist” is a mockery.
August 6, 2019
Hay que leer este libro con un entendimiento previo de lo sucedido en La Guerra de Líbano del 82 y lo que significó para lo sociedad israelí. Situándose en ese momento histórico, es exquisito leer varios artículos de Amos Oz sobre ese momento en la historia de Israel, con su característica profundidad.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews