On Tuesday 27th February 2001, a group of between 15 and 20 people demonstrated outside St James's Church, Piccadilly, where Amos Oz was being honoured by PEN, a literary club which champions the oppressed.
Amos Oz has for many years had an undeserved reputation as a peace activist. He had, however, blown this cover by writing an article in Britain's Guardian newspaper blaming the Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and the Palestinians for not accepting the then Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak's peace proposals and, thereby, allowing the right-wing Likud bloc leader Ariel Sharon to win the Israeli prime ministerial election.
Had Amos Oz taken the trouble to base his observations on the facts of the dispossession of the Palestinian people from their land in 1947-48, he would never have taken up this position. Since the creation of the state of Israel, when the Palestinians were expected to give up the best part of their land and be ruled by newcomers, they have been seen as the cause of the trouble. The message has been "the Palestinians are to blame". This has always been, and still is, the Zionist claim. We want only peace, they say, whilst grabbing more land and imposing more restrictions on the Palestinians. Sadly, for more than 50 years they have managed to convince most people, and this is still the case today.
At the beginning of the picket, we were able to stand in two lines facing each other with our posters, which read, "Amos Oz - put your own house in order [picture of Sharon]: Indict the war criminal Ariel Sharon" and "Apartheid is not a 'generous peace offer'". One member had also prepared a paper giving our objections to the Oz presentation in more detail, and he handed out copies of it. The people going into the church were clearly interested in our messages, but not a little surprised, and some stood in front of us reading the posters over and over again. A few became angry and our Jewish and Israeli participants came in for some abuse.
After around 30 minutes, although we were in no way causing a problem , we were told we could no longer stand in the forecourt of the church and we were put out into Piccadilly. Although those going into the Oz celebration no longer stood and read our posters, many passers-by did show an interest and we even acquired another demonstrator and her son.
I was interviewed by a reporter from a transatlantic Jewish News Agency. He, too, was puzzled, but nevertheless prepared to listen and seemed interested.
Two or three of our people did try to go into the church after the demonstration, but were recognized by two "bouncers" who refused them entry.