Nobel Prize winner Elfriede Jelinek denounces Gaza as "ethnic cleansing for a promised land"

Austrian Nobel Prize winner for literature Elfriede Jelinek condemned on her website the policies of a "criminal" like Benjamin Netanyahu, who is making "countless innocent people pay" in Gaza, "mostly women and children." "Israel must live, but we must also let the Palestinians live," wrote the 78-year-old writer, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2004 and who denounced Hamas after the October 7 attack, in a text seen by AFP on Friday.

"Listen: not all Palestinians are banking on terrorism," the intellectual believes, lamenting "the destruction of their home" and "the deaths of tens of thousands of people ." She regrets that the "de facto unconditional solidarity with Israel" and the "never again" of Austria and Germany because of their responsibility in the genocide of European Jews, has become an "empty shell, a floor covered with carpet bombs."

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The author, whose Jewish father survived National Socialism, speaks of "settler colonialism in defiance of international law," "ethnic cleansing for a promised land" that belongs "to all Jews but no one else ." She calls for support from "democrats" in Israel, who "relentlessly oppose this far-right government," while "historic plans to annex Gaza (...) now threaten to become reality." "Instead of the historically blinded and thoughtless 'pro-Israel' stance of the political class and public opinion in our countries, we should instead side with the desperate efforts of Israeli human rights groups," writes Elfriede Jelinek.

After October 7, 2023, the Nobel laureate compared the "terrorist organization" Hamas to the Nazis, believing that it wanted to "annihilate " Israel, the "only democratic state in the region." This bloody attack resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on official data. Of the 251 people kidnapped in Israel that day, 58 are still being held in Gaza, including 34 declared dead by the Israeli army. The Israeli offensive carried out in retaliation left at least 52,760 dead in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to data from the Hamas Health Ministry, deemed reliable by the UN. Committed to fighting the far right in her country, Elfriede Jelinek is the author of numerous novels and plays, including The Pianist, adapted for the cinema by her compatriot Michael Haneke .