Daniel Barenboim

“I am asking today with deep sorrow: Can we, despite all our achievements, ignore the intolerable gap between what the Declaration of Independence promised and what was fulfilled, the gap between the idea and the realities of Israel? Does the condition of occupation and domination over another people fit the Declaration of Independence? Is there any sense in the independence of one at the expense of the fundamental rights of the other?” In this speech to the Knesset upon receiving the Wolf Prize delivered May 9, world-renowned musician and conductor of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Daniel Barenboim asked difficult, but necessary questions.

Perhaps the first thing one remembers about Edward Said was his breadth of interest. He was not only at home in music, literature, philosophy, or the understanding of politics, but also he was one of those rare people who saw the connections and the parallels between different disciplines, because he had an unusual understanding of the human spirit, and of the human being, and he recognized that parallels and paradoxes are not contradictions. The Palestinians have lost one of the most eloquent defenders of their aspirations. I have lost my soul mate.