Forgiveness and revenge – a daughter’s story

In Revenge the author, Laura Blumenfeld, who is a journalist, tries to understand the mentality of the man who shot her father in Jerusalem in 1986 and how she should respond to this – is revenge the correct response ? Her father wasn’t seriously injured but he could have been killed and the shooter was a member of faction of the PLO who were, at the time, targeting tourists.

The author does two main things in her quest for understanding and a way forward. The first is that she examines responses to violence and the history of revenge. She interviews people across the world who have been involved in blood feuds and revenge attacks, and looks at the history of hate and its legacy. This is fascinating stuff and it illuminates how societies think about and react to violence.

What the author also does in her quest seems to me to be less admirable. She befriends the family of the shooter, who is in jail, but fabricates a story and doesn’t disclose her identity. She also tries to see the shooter in jail and uses the family contacts to help her get access. Although she mentions a few times that people she knows think that her actions are suspect she rather shrugs it off because of her need to know about the shooter and to understand his motivations. I found this morally dubious and didn’t think that her wish to understand these things was more important than the family’s right to truth and transparency.

The author finds a way through in her thinking which she applies quite publically and openly. Having reached a point of forgiveness and understanding she wants others to hear her and give her opinion weight. We only get her side of the story so we don’t know how the authorities and the family take this intervention. It seems quite arrogant to me.

This book is a mixture of approaches to the issue but it is also a very personal journey and, as such, it concentrates on the thinking of the author. I found it difficult to accept all her actions and felt that the book was a little too much focussed on her and didn’t give a full story. This was just my opinion, however, and this book is well thought of and highly regarded by others.