Two-State Friendship
Postscript No. 1 | Ramsey Alsheikh and Elan Kluger on Israel-Palestine
THE NEW CRITIC — POSTSCRIPT
*What follows is a conversation between Ramsey Alsheikh and Elan Kluger, founding editor of The New Critic. Ramsey is a 21-year-old writer from Florida studying Middle Eastern Studies and Computer Science at Dartmouth College. Elan is a 21-year-old writer from Michigan studying intellectual history at Dartmouth College.
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This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.*
ELAN KLUGER Let’s begin with how we got to know each other.
RAMSEY ALSHEIKH The first time I met you was in Arabic class.
KLUGER Before. I was thinking about this. At orientation when we went around to different departments. The Jewish Studies program was advertising their new class on Israel-Palestine and I was flipping through the syllabus and you walked over. I was looking at Benny Morris’s book on the syllabus. I said I like him and you said I hate him and that was the only interaction we had.
ALSHEIKH I have no recollection of this, but that is so funny to me. That’s crazy. It’s fate, it was destiny — then in spring in Arabic you were much more reserved. One time I followed you after class to Rauner Library and we chatted a little bit.
KLUGER Then we both did the study abroad to Morocco for Arabic, in the summer after freshman year. We started a little essay reading group — reading William James and Ghassan Kanafani and Camus.
ALSHEIKH Yeah, we just hung out a lot talking about ideas. Great conversations just walking through Rabat. And then the next big event was our walk to Casablanca, sixty miles along the Atlantic coast. And we went and ate at all the kosher restaurants in Casablanca.
KLUGER Apparently there’s another kosher restaurant in Casablanca.
ALSHEIKH Next time, next time. We’ll have to go back. Then sophomore year we were normal friends until the next fall.
KLUGER Yeah and then in the fall I was doing research in Jerusalem and you were in Budapest and I stayed on your floor when I visited.
ALSHEIKH Magical city. It was really lovely to have you, that was a great time. Let’s talk about why we are doing the questions. What do we hope to get out of this?
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