Neil Berry reports on Gideon Levy's recent UK book tour for the Arab News. Levy was in Scotland, Manchester and London to promote The Punishment of Gaza.
The issue of what it means to be on Israel's side is thrown into sharp relief by the career of the redoubtable Israeli journalist, Gideon Levy, who has been touring Britain to promote his excoriating new book, "The Punishment of Gaza". The veteran columnist for the liberal Israeli newspaper Haaretz writes as one for whom the righteous claims his country makes are so belied by its psychotic conduct as to be an insult to the brain. What makes Levy such an impressive figure is that he has no hesitation in voicing unqualified dismay at the kind of country Israel has become. He believes that it is candor not uncritical sycophancy that is the hallmark of one who truly cares about a country or about a fellow human being...
Brimming with moral urgency in person and on the page, Gideon Levy is a fresh incarnation of an ancient Jewish type: The prophet without honor in his own land.
Visit the Arab News to read the piece in full.
Jon Snow was in conversation with Gideon Levy at two events in London this week, and blogged about the first on the Channel 4 website:
To Amnesty International last night for a session with Gideon Levy the iconic columnist (the Twilight Zone) of the widely regarded Haaretz newspaper. He’s an increasingly lone voice in Israeli journalism, urging his fellow countryman to recognise what their illegal occupation of Palestinian lands is doing to their own society, their own country.