The word fan, as in a fan of sports team or rock group, derives from the word fanatic, a word that more often than not refers to extreme religious passion, and itself comes from a Latin term for someone driven mad by a divine spirit. In recent decades, it has begotten the words fandom (a subculture of fans) and fan fiction, which Veronica Clarke describes as “stories about fictional characters or real-life celebrities, written by the fans, for the fans.” This genre is the subject of Esther Yi’s Y/N: A Novel:

Yi’s nameless protagonist, a lonely and bored twenty-nine-year-old Korean-American woman living in Berlin, becomes obsessed with a Korean boy-band star, or “idol,” called Moon. After she sees him perform live, her “world suddenly proliferate[s] with secret avenues of devotion.” In him, she finds her raison d’être.

Yi’s narrator lives in Berlin, a foreign city; she isn’t fluent in German. She is divorced from her past; she isn’t fluent in Korean. She met her roommate online. They share something that can only “almost be called a friendship.” Her boyfriend, whom she also met online, is merely “considering being in love with” her. No family is mentioned, except for an estranged uncle in Seoul. . . . “I don’t want real life,” she declares. “I don’t even want romance. . . . I need something else. Piercing recognition. Metaphysics. Byzantine iconography.” But those hints at a religious awakening go nowhere. Instead, she begins to write fan fiction.

“K-pop is a symbol that, in my opinion, traffics in displaced spirituality,” Yi told Publishers Weekly in an interview. . . . “To me, it’s a natural consequence of the sort of conditions under which she’s living.”

So, Clarke surmises, is fan fiction itself. The words here give away much: not just fan, but also idol, and a fictional location in the book called the Sanctuary. Yet, writes Clarke, “this kind of failed transcendence, which privileges emotional intensity—the more intense, the better—over truth and reality, easily takes a dark turn.”

In a momentous meeting with the Syrian president Ahmed al-Sharaa in Riyadh, President Trump announced that he is lifting sanctions on the beleaguered and war-torn country. On the one hand, Sharaa is an alumnus of Islamic State and al-Qaeda, who came to power as commander of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which itself began life as al-Qaeda’s Syrian offshoot; he also seems to enjoy the support of Qatar. On the other hand, he overthrew the Assad regime—a feat made possible by the battering Israel delivered to Hizballah—greatly improving Jerusalem’s strategic position, and ending one of the world’s most atrocious and brutal tyrannies. President Trump also announced that he hopes Syria will join the Abraham Accords.

This analysis by Eran Lerman was published a few days ago, and in some respects is already out of date, but more than anything else I’ve read it helps to make sense of Israel’s strategic position vis-à-vis Syria.

Israel’s primary security interest lies in defending against worst-case scenarios, particularly the potential collapse of the Syrian state or its transformation into an actively hostile force backed by a significant Turkish presence (considering that the Turkish military is the second largest in NATO) with all that this would imply. Hence the need to bolster the new buffer zone—not for territorial gain, but as a vital shield and guarantee against dangerous developments. Continued airstrikes aimed at diminishing the residual components of strategic military capabilities inherited from the Assad regime are essential.

At the same time, there is a need to create conditions that would enable those in Damascus who wish to reject the reduction of their once-proud country into a Turkish satrapy. Sharaa’s efforts to establish his legitimacy, including his visit to Paris and outreach to the U.S., other European nations, and key Gulf countries, may generate positive leverage in this regard. Israel’s role is to demonstrate through daily actions the severe costs of acceding to Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ambitions and accepting Turkish hegemony.

Israel should also assist those in Syria (and beyond: this may have an effect in Lebanon as well) who look to it as a strategic anchor in the region. The Druze in Syria—backed by their brethren in Israel—have openly expressed this expectation, breaking decades of loyalty to the central power in Damascus over their obligation to their kith and kin.