Fima - Amos Oz [104]
"Just drop it, will you, sir? Me, my views just get people worked up. They start listening to me and they head straight for a breakdown. That's the reason I stopped having discussions long ago. So hang onto your temper. If I was in charge of this country, I'd have it back on its feet in three months. But the Israeli people have given up thinking with their brains. They think only with their bellies. And their balls. So why should I waste my health for nothing? Every time I get in a discussion, it just burns up the nerves. It's hopeless. It's mob rule here. Worse than the Arabs."
Fima said:
"What if I promise not to get worked up, and not to get you worked up? We can always agree to differ."
"Okay then," said the driver, "only just remember you asked for it. Well, for me it's like this: For a real peace, so called, with assurances and guarantees and safeguards, for a peace like that I'd personally give them all the Territories except the Western Wall, and I'd even say thank you to them for taking Ramallah and Gaza off my back. Ever since that shit landed on us in 'sixty-seven, the state's been going to the dogs. They've made a right mess of us. Well, how about it? Am I getting on your nerves? Are you going to start farting the Bible at me?"
Fima had difficulty containing his feelings:
"And how, may I ask, did you arrive at this conclusion?"
"In the end," said the driver wearily, "everybody will. Maybe only after we lose another few thousand lives. There's no other way, sir. The Arab is not going to evaporate, and neither are we, and we're about as capable of living together as a cat and a mouse. That's real life, and it's also just. It's written in the Torah: if two customers arc holding onto a tallith and they're both shouting that it's theirs, then you take a pair of scissors and you cut it in half. That's what Moses himself decided, and he was no idiot. Better to cut the tallith than to keep cutting babies. Which street did you say?"
Fima said:
"Well done!"
And the driver:
"What do you mean, well done? What do you mean by that? What do you take me for, a cat that's learned to fly? If you happened to be of the same opinion, I wouldn't say well done to you just for that. What I will say to you, and listen hard, is there's only one man in this country who's strong enough to cut the tallith in half without getting cut in half himself, and that's Arik Sharon. Nobody else can do it. They'll take it from him."
"Despite the fact that he has blood on his hands?"
"Not despite: because. First of all, he's not the one with the bloody hands; it's the whole state. You and me too. Don't go pinning it all on him. Besides which, I don't have a weeping conscience over the bloodshed. Sorrow, yes, but not shame. That's for the Arabs, not us. It's not as if we wanted to shed blood. The Arabs forced us to. From the word go. On our side we never wanted to start the violence. Even Menahem Begin, a proud patriot if ever there was one. The moment Sadat came along to the Knesset to say sorry, he gave him what he wanted, just so long as the bloodshed stopped. If Arafat came along to the Knesset to say sorry, he'd get something too. So? Let Arik go and strike a deal, gangster to gangster. What do you think, that some bleeding heart Yossi Sarid or other is going to do business with that scum Arafat? Yossi Sarid, the Arabs would make mincemeat out of him, and then someone from our side would give him a bellyful of lead, and that would be the end of that. Best let Arik do the cutting. Any time you've got to do business with a ravenous beast, hire a hunter to do the