Censored in Israel, the novelist who is a 'threat to Jewish identity'

Dorit Rabinyan’s story of an affair across the Israeli-Palestinian divide became a cause célèbre. 

A year ago, Israeli novelist Dorit Rabinyan's third book had been selected for the national curriculum. Then, abruptly, it was withdrawn by the education ministry because of its subject matter.

For Rabinyan, that has meant examining how art in Israel has come to be regarded by some as dangerous.“Art and literature are about a magical appeal to identity and empathy. How an identity in literature is transferred into your own identity so that you care for a fictional stranger so that you get into his skin and wear his gaze. This is what is so powerful. It is an antidote to the armoury we are requested to put on. This shield of ignorance and indifference and apathy. Because if you really sense everything, if you don’t wear this shield, it is painful.”