Madness

When is violence justified? That's the question I woke up with this morning after seeing news reports last night of Israel's ground offensive into Gaza. It's madness. Of course Israel has a right to defend itself, but killing hundreds of people, including many innocent children, is an outrage. There is no proportionality. Can you imagine the Spanish army invading France because ETA terrorists based there had set off a car bomb in San Sebastian? It really is despicable. But I don't want to write more about that, it's just upsetting. Yesterday I took Alma and Jake to the airport in Granada for their flight to Gerona. Daniela and Cristina came along. Our plan was to visit the Alhambra in the morning, but by the time we got up there the tickets were all sold out. It was too bad, but it was a rainy day and not a good moment for that kind of experience. We did get to see the Royal Chapel and downtown Granada. These long holidays have really got my sense of time messed up. Tuesday it finally comes to an end with Reyes Magos. Then it's back to normal time. And a normal diet! And speaking of Granada, this morning I read in El País of a different kind of madness: Granada has one of the last remaining monuments to fascism in Europe. The monument shows five hands in a fascist salute, dedicated to José Antonio Primo de Rivera, the founder of the Spanish Falange. It's amazing that it is still standing. (That's it in the photo above.) Poet Luis García Montero, whose troubles with a colleague I wrote about a couple of months ago, is involved with other writers and artists in another effort to convince city council to finally remove it. Ironically, as a child he participated in the fundraising to pay for the monument's creation in 1972. (1972!) I ran into Luis here in Malaga a couple of weeks ago and we talked about his coming to Dickinson next fall. Hopefully it will work out.