Perle besserman biography of michael

Set during the hopeful yet turbulent years of the Clinton-sponsored Camp David peace talks between Yasir Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin, Widow Zion traces the unlikely romantic encounter of a wealthy Jewish American widow on a “Holy Land Tour” and her recalcitrant escort, an Israeli widower and war-weary old soldier. Their meeting results in a poignant, and eventually tragic, series of misadventures set into motion by Aryeh’s well-intentioned matchmaking cousin Leo, a Holocaust survivor driven by conflicting desires for material success and an almost mystical passion for tikkun—spiritual repair of a broken world. Bruised by her troubled marriage and traumatized by the recent suicide of her favored son, Stella is initially cynical and resists Leo’s mission; while Aryeh, too literally and figuratively wounded by Israel’s legacy of never-ending war, clings to old family grudges and resents his cousin’s intrusion. But Leo is a force too powerful to resist, and both inevitably succumb to h