Sol Salbe has done the world a great service by translating David Grossman’s essay about the death of a Palestinian in Israeli police custody. It is all too reminiscent of an Australian indigenous death in custody story.
As Sol writes:
Last Friday Haaretz did something unusual: it placed an opinion piece on top of its front page. But it wasn’t just an ordinary opinion piece, it was written by one of the country foremost novelists, David Grossman. The article, like Emile Zola’s J’accuse, to which it has been compared, was a moral critique. Many who read it were very moved. But the moral missive never appeared in English (at least to my knowledge). The English Haaretz has always been somewhat reticent in presenting Israel to the world. And of course translating Grossman is not easy, he is a master of the language and the art of writing.I have no idea whether I have done justice to this work. But it needed to be translated. The message is too important.*Hebrew original: http://www.haaretz.co.il/news/politics/1.1649589*Translated by Sol Salbe of the Middle East News Service, Melbourne Australia .
For the rest go to “Sol’s FB page.