"Even the pyramids might one day disappear, but not the Palestinians longing for their homeland"
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Shevardnadze reaches for the pyramids because they’re the nearest shorthand for permanence: stone that has outlasted empires, religions, and languages. Then he pulls the rug out. If even that can “one day disappear,” he implies, the Palestinian claim is not a passing grievance but a force more durable than monuments. It’s a neat political inversion: history isn’t anchored in artifacts; it’s anchored in people who refuse to stop wanting something.
The line is doing two jobs at once. On the surface it’s solidarity, a public moral posture from a Soviet-era statesman turned post-Soviet leader who knew what it meant to bargain in a world where borders and loyalties could be redrawn overnight. Underneath, it’s a warning to policymakers who treat the conflict as a management problem. You can demolish houses, police movement, redraw maps, and still not erase the longing that keeps reproducing itself across generations.
The pyramids also smuggle in a regional frame. They evoke the Arab world’s ancient grandeur, positioning Palestinians not as a temporary “refugee issue” but as part of a civilizational continuity. That’s rhetorically potent because it counters the bureaucratic language that often surrounds Palestine: negotiations, security arrangements, “final status.” Shevardnadze is betting on the stubbornness of memory. Even if the landscape is leveled, he suggests, the idea of home remains politically radioactive - not romantic, but irreversible.
The line is doing two jobs at once. On the surface it’s solidarity, a public moral posture from a Soviet-era statesman turned post-Soviet leader who knew what it meant to bargain in a world where borders and loyalties could be redrawn overnight. Underneath, it’s a warning to policymakers who treat the conflict as a management problem. You can demolish houses, police movement, redraw maps, and still not erase the longing that keeps reproducing itself across generations.
The pyramids also smuggle in a regional frame. They evoke the Arab world’s ancient grandeur, positioning Palestinians not as a temporary “refugee issue” but as part of a civilizational continuity. That’s rhetorically potent because it counters the bureaucratic language that often surrounds Palestine: negotiations, security arrangements, “final status.” Shevardnadze is betting on the stubbornness of memory. Even if the landscape is leveled, he suggests, the idea of home remains politically radioactive - not romantic, but irreversible.
Quote Details
| Topic | Human Rights |
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