There are moments in life when we are tempted to make a confession. It is not difficult to control these impulses, as soon as I think about it the simple presumption that it might interest others stops me. I never usually take the step due to lack of relief. I usually take refuge in a technical, professional analysis, focused on data, on history, on the concepts that give meaning to our political debate. Lately, in “the amnesty”, of which we have been doing an extensive series since the summer. However, this week, with the heart of Gaza in a total emergency, I am forced to give vent to my memories, impressions and feelings. And when I think about Israel, one name always resonates in my head: Shimon Peres. When I met him he was the president of the State. He went ten years ago to Tel Aviv in a small delegation. And his political figure in person, which I delved into before at the university along with Bill Clinton, Yitzhak Rabin and Yasir Arafat, had a great impact on me.
His language was direct and fast. His optimistic, wide-open eyes projected gratitude, compassion, and action. He smiled as he listened, his use of words exuding an astonishing creativity and capacity for synthesis. He gave the impression that he was speaking directly to you, like when he told us that during his time as minister two people on his team, a boy and a girl, fell madly in love. Every day the boy wrote love letters to the girl. Then he asked us: “Who did the girl stay with?” Silence. And he answered himself after three seconds: “With the postman.” He believed very much in the local and hated middlemen. He said that in today's world the separation between nations was greater than between generations. And he saw young people as the only ones capable of having the global impact necessary to achieve peace. More than any State, leader or generals combined. He recalled that in the Middle East there are more than 140 million smartphones. Many cannot escape their governments, but they can escape their ideologies. He knew that wars were completely useless. And that in today's world they had lost all rational motivation and moral justification. Achieving peace consisted of pursuing it, rather than seeking it.
He also stated that if he had earned the title of “expert,” it was only in what had already happened. Therefore, he is amazed to see various experts on Israel and Palestine who are so sure of who is good and bad amid a complex range of grays. Certainties that I, at least, lack. The unpredictability is absolute. Peres confessed that Ben Gurion, Israel's first prime minister, once told him “that the Government is responsible for everything that exists but you (us), for what does not exist.” Life had given him almost 3 billion seconds to make a positive impact on others. Without a doubt, he achieved it. Prevailing a vision to recover: Israel will have security if Palestine has hope. Before saying goodbye he also taught us how the size of a good president is measured: “By the number of calls you have to make to talk to him. With me, you have only needed one,” he said. He was then 90 years old.
When he died three years after the meeting, and just like today, I thought about some of those seconds of his life. How Peres in 1992 faced his political enemy Rabin in an internal election to see who would be prime minister. How they both agree to name whoever he lost as Foreign Minister. How Peres narrowly loses. How they achieved the Oslo agreements that they signed in the White House in 1993. And how on November 4, 1995, a surprised, excited and happy Rabin hugged Peres at a rally. He had never done it. Not even when they achieved his greatest achievements. How they sang Shir LaShalom, the song of peace, before more than 100,000 people that day. And how a few minutes later he felt as if someone had stuck a knife in his chest, leaving him breathless, with his heart pierced. Three shots from an Israeli, a Jew, one of their own, ended Rabin's life. When I remember it I think why so many calls have to be made, I want to put an end to the “postman” and only the hope of young people prevents me from doing so while I see how the civilian population flees en masse to the south of Gaza.
