Revenge: A Story of Hope
Books / Hardcover
Books › Political Science › Reference
ISBN: 0684853167 / Publisher: Simon & Schuster, March 2002
The "Washington Post" reporter who went undercover to seek out the Palestinian terrorist who had shot her father travels the globe collecting tales of personal vengeance while probing the psychology of this primal emotion.
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In 1986, Laura Blumenfeld's father was shot in Jerusalem by a member of a rebel faction of the PLO responsible for attacks on several tourists in the Old City. Her father lived, but Blumenfeld's desire for revenge haunted her. This is her story. Traveling to Europe, America, and the Middle East, Blumenfeld gathers stories and methods of avengers worldwide as she plots to infiltrate the shooter's life. Through interviews with Yitzhak Rabin's assassin; with members of the Albanian Blood Feud Committee; the chief of the Iranian judiciary; the mayor of Palermo, Sicily; an Egyptian heroin smuggler; the Israeli prime minister and the military chief of staff; priests; sports fans; fifth-grade girls; and prostitutes, among others, she explores the mechanics and the psychology of vengeance. But ultimately it is a journey that leads her back home -- where she is forced to confront her childhood dreams, her parents' failed marriage, and her ideas about family. In the end, her target turns out to be more complex -- and in some ways more threatening -- than the stereotypical terrorist she'd long imagined. A rare, ambitious, personal, and intellectual tour of dark urges often denied, Revenge: A Story of Hope is a beautifully written story about family, loyalty, and home, about the personal passions behind public events, and about the thin line between love and hate.
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