Last month the New Green Horizons webzine offered an excerpt of a recently-published book written by Madelyn Hoffman, a co-chair of the US Green Party Peace Action Committee. Below is a review of the book by Steve Welzer.
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A Fleeting Glance: How One Look Across an Apartheid Wall Can Change Lives
By Madelyn Hoffman
London: Euro Books, 2025.
How many books have you read where your eyes tear up every other page?
Madelyn Hoffman’s succinct fictional rendition of selected diary entries of two girls—one Palestinian and one Israeli— is only 80 pages, yet it took me much longer to read than I anticipated. As I made my way through the narrative, the associated events transpiring in real time induced my mind to drift toward the tragic actuality that must haunt the everyday experiences of children caught within the Levantine vortex. Reflecting upon such took up as much time as the reading of the text.
Madelyn is not a novelist, she’s an activist. So the impact of her tale goes beyond tugging at the heartstrings; it is intended to motivate active response. The pathos of envisaging Palestinian existence through the eyes of a child is almost unbearable. The disquiet of imagining the inner turmoil of an adolescent trying to come to terms with the issues raised by Israeli socialization and inculcation is sad and enervating.
In regard to the genesis of her project, Madelyn has written: “In December 2013, I had my initial first-hand look at the ugly apartheid wall in occupied Palestine, the part of the wall that encircles Jerusalem. I witnessed the impact of the separation of Palestinians living in East Jerusalem and Israelis in the city of Jerusalem, a city sacred to the three monotheistic religions. I also traveled to Al-Khalil (Hebron) in the illegally occupied West Bank. A drive that should have taken 20 minutes took about an hour and a half because of the check points and because Palestinians aren’t allowed to drive on rapid-transit roads reserved for Israelis only. After two days in the West Bank, I found myself changed for life.”
A Fleeting Glance follows Mariam and Miriam as they come of age under the shadow of apartheid and ethnic cleansing in the West Bank. The story follows the two girls for over a decade, starting when both are 8 years old. Mariam, a Palestinian, sees Miriam, an Israeli settler, through the wire netting constructed by Palestinians to catch the garbage and human wastes that settlers throw down toward them.
Miriam watches her mother casually throw garbage into the netting. At that moment, the two girls catch a fleeting glance of each other. They recognize how much they resemble one another. Over the ensuing years Miriam grows increasingly disgusted with the system that turned her own parents into the kind of people who would feel empowered to dump garbage on the heads of children, while Mariam tries not to succumb to blanket hatred for the oppressors of her people. All along, they both remain haunted by a moment that could have allowed them to hear one another if they had been able to interact. But both know this to be impossible under the Israeli system of apartheid.
All proceeds from the author’s personal sales of the book will be directed to two Palestinian families. One is still living in Gaza under inhumane conditions. Another is the family that inspired the book; they are living in continually deteriorating conditions in Al-Khalil on the West Bank. It was a member of the latter family who acted as Madelyn’s guide during her two-day visit there and pointed out the wire-netting constructed by Palestinians in order to cover, as much as possible, the stone main road of the old city.
Madelyn Hoffman has said: “I hope the message of my book will provide an opportunity for dialogue toward an international response of solidarity.” The text is being translated into both Arabic and Spanish. It’s the kind of book one wishes could be available to impact the hearts and minds of peoples of all countries and all cultures.
Book Review: A Fleeting Glance by Madelyn Hoffman
