Amos Oz Quotes

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Amos Oz

Profession : Writer

Birth : May 4, 1939

The idea that all Israelis are villains is a childish idea. Israel is the most deeply divided, argumentative society. You'll never find two Israelis that agree with one another - it's hard to find even one who agrees with himself or herself.

Amos Oz

The opposite of compromise is fanaticism and death.

Amos Oz

And in this respect, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been a tragedy, a clash between one very powerful, very convincing, very painful claim over this land and another no less powerful, no less convincing claim.

Amos Oz

Two children of same cruel parent look at one another and see in each other the image of the cruel parent or the image of their past oppressor. This is very much the case between Jew and Arab: It's a conflict between two victims.

Amos Oz

I think loathing begets fanaticism, and in the end, loathing begets hatred and violence.

Amos Oz

Literature is always about bygone times. It's always looking back in time with a certain perspective. I look at bygone life which no longer exists, and as I said, I look at it without nostalgia but without anger, either. I look at it with criticism and with compassion. I look at it with curiosity.

Amos Oz

But The Same Sea is set precisely in this Israel, which never makes it to the news headlines anywhere. It is a novel about everyday people far removed from fundamentalism, fanaticism nationalism, or militancy of any sort.

Amos Oz

I've been called a traitor a few times in my life by some of my countrymen.

Amos Oz

I wrote a novel about Israelis who live their own lives on the slope of a volcano. Near a volcano one still falls in love, one still gets jealous, one still wants a promotion, one still gossips.

Amos Oz

Writing in modern Hebrew is a bit like playing chamber music inside a huge, empty cathedral. If you are not very careful with the echoes, you may evoke some monstrosities.

Amos Oz

In many ways, I regard Sharon and Arafat as birds of a feather.

Amos Oz

It is crystal clear to me that if Arabs put down a draft resolution blaming Israel for the recent earthquake in Iran it would probably have a majority, the U.S. would veto it and Britain and France would abstain.

Amos Oz

Trump is many things. He is pampered. He is an immature man. He is a teenager craving unconditional, endless love from everybody.

Amos Oz

I recommend the art of slow reading.

Amos Oz

'Oz' means strength - and it also means courage.

Amos Oz

A conflict begins and ends in the hearts and minds of people, not in the hilltops.

Amos Oz

If we don't stop somewhere, if we don't accept an unhappy compromise, unhappy for both sides, if we don't learn how to unhappily coexist and contain our burned sense of injustice - if we don't learn how to do that, we end up in a doomed state.

Amos Oz

Throughout my childhood, a heavy cloud of pain and disappointment and insecurity hovered over my home, my little street, my neighborhood, Jewish Jerusalem, Jewish Israel.

Amos Oz

Every country in the world should follow the example of President Trump and move the embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. But simultaneously, there should be an embassy of all countries in the world in East Jerusalem as the capital of the state of Palestine.

Amos Oz

There is a difference between myself and some of the peace people in Europe: whereas they think that the ultimate evil in the world is war, I think the ultimate evil in the world is aggression, and aggression sometimes must be repelled by force.

Amos Oz