Literary giant and peace activist tells Italy’s La Repubblica that the very use of the word in association with Israel signals devastating moral collapse tied to ‘the occupation’
By AFP and ToI Staff
1 August 2025
Award-winning Israeli author David Grossman called the country’s campaign in Gaza a “genocide” on Friday for the first time, noting that he uses the term with “immense pain and a broken heart,” in conversation with the Italian daily La Repubblica.
His comments came amid rising global alarm and anger over widespread hunger in the war-torn territory due to the insufficient entry of food.
“For many years, I refused to use that term, ‘genocide,’” the prominent writer and peace activist told the newspaper. “But now, after the images I have seen and after talking to people who were there, I can’t help but use it.
This word is an avalanche: Once you say it, it just gets bigger, like an avalanche. And it adds even more destruction and suffering,” he said. “Even just saying that word — ‘genocide’ — in reference to Israel, to the Jewish people, the fact that such a comparison is even being made, tells us that something very bad is happening to us.”
Grossman’s works, which have been translated into dozens of languages, have won many international prizes.
He also won Israel’s top literary prize in 2018, the Israel Prize for Literature, for his work spanning more than three decades.
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https://www.timesofisrael.com/with-broken-heart-author-david-grossman-calls-israeli-actions-in-gaza-genocide/
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