Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, May/June 1998, Pages 84-88

Other People’s Mail

Some letters by or to other people are as informative for our readers as anything we might write ourselves.

Now a Former Subscriber

To Mr. Victor Navasky, Publisher and Editorial Director, The Nation, New York, NY, March 10, 1998.

I am a former subscriber to The Nation, allowing my subscription to expire because of your excessive subscription price in Canada compared to the U.S. which cannot all be due to postage.

Recently I had been considering renewing my subscription but was put off by your outrageous FLAME ads. Still considering whether I should write to you about that, I next saw your arrogant, unbelievably twisted letter on the subject to “The Bacons, Corona, CA” reprinted in the March issue of the Washington Report.

That settles the matter for me once and for all. I will not now or ever subscribe to a magazine that confuses First Amendment Rights with the right to publish deliberately misleading, mendacious advertising.

In a letter from Mr. Gerardo Joffe, president of FLAME, which the Washington Report also published, Mr. Joffe states, inter alia, “I am fascinated...by the perseverance and resilience of the Jewish people who have...survived 2,000 years of the most cruel persecution culminating in the Holocaust of this century...” So am I. So much the more, however, I am deeply ashamed that this honorable survival should have culminated in our time by giving birth to a chauvinistic, racist, bigoted little statelet with hegemonic aspirations, that treats the indigenous people of Palestine (who historically have lived there longer than we ever did) with the same cruelty our ancestors suffered. The Holocaust is simply no excuse for that. The Palestinians were not responsible for that atrocity. Why should they be made to pay for it?

In any event, in this day and age when we have achieved equality and recognition in most countries of the world, it is high time Jews—and especially Zionists—stop playing the eternal victim.

M. Kauders, Toronto, Ont. Canada

FLAME’s Misleading Ads

To the Editor, The Nation, Dec. 30, 1998 (as submitted).

We know that you have to pay the bills, but the series of ads by FLAME in recent issues of The Nation are so misleading that I hope you will allow us to rebut just a few of their so-called “facts.”

Assertion #1) At the turn of the century, Palestine was “a sparsely-settled country.” But according to Lord Balfour himself, Palestine was home to 700,000 Arabs in 1917 when the Balfour Declaration was written; and according to John Chancellor, Britain’s high commissioner for Palestine during part of their Mandate, “all cultivable land was occupied; no cultivable land now in possession of indigenous population could be sold to Jews without creating a class of landless Arab cultivators.”

Assertion #2) “Herzl’s vision fired up world Jewry and especially the Jews of Eastern Europe.” The precursors to the Zionist organization, the Lovers of Zion, tried to convince Russian Jews to emigrate to Palestine but most Russian Jews ignored their appeal and fled to Europe and the United States. By 1900, almost a million Jews had settled in the U.S. alone, while only a few thousand emigrated to Palestine.

Assertion #3) “Regrettably, Britain decided that...a Jewish national home would not apply east of the Jordan River.” True, but according to Noam Chomsky, “the number of Jews living there permanently in 1921 has been reliably estimated at two or, according to some authorities, three persons.”

Assertion #4) During the 1948 war, “Israel defeated the combined might of the aggressors.” But according to Menachem Begin, “In Jerusalem, as elsewhere, we were the first to pass from the defensive to the offensive.” This included the massacre at Deir Yassin, in which 250 unarmed Arab civilians were killed in cold blood on April 9, 1948. This was prior to the Arab states declaring war on Israel for having expelled or frightened hundreds of thousands of the indigenous Arab inhabitants into leaving their homeland.

Assertion #5) Israel is “the world leader in exports per capita.” Maybe so, but we wonder what they are exporting? It wouldn’t happen to be Uzi automatic weapons to Third World military butchers, like El Salvador and Guatemala, would it? And on and on...

The truth is that Palestine had been an overwhelmingly Arab country for over 1,200 years and the Arabs traced their ethnic roots back many thousands of years before that to the Canaanites and other tribes that lived in Palestine long before the Jewish people even existed! The Zionist movement was based on a faulty, colonialist world-view that the rights of the indigenous inhabitants didn’t count. Arab opposition to Zionism was not based on anti-Semitism but rather on their correct perception that the Zionists, from the beginning, planned on “a practically complete dispossession of the present non-Jewish inhabitants of Palestine,” (according to the King-Crane commission sent to Palestine by the U.S. government in 1919.)

For an in-depth look at these and similar questions, we will be happy to send you our free booklet, The Origin of Palestine/Israel Conflict, if you write to Jews For Justice in the Middle East, P.O. Box 14561, Berkeley, CA 94712. Peace!

Ken Stone, Berkeley, CA

N.Y. Times’ False Theories

To The New York Times, Feb. 15, 1998 (as submitted).

The lead article in Sunday’s Week in Review headed “Tribes of Israel: Security’s Bitter Fruit: And Urge to Fight” was published at a most inappropriate time. Never have the people of Israel, including my children and grandchildren, felt less secure. They have a double fear: the fear of Iraqi Scuds armed with God-knows-what, and the fear that the intifada and suicide bombers may explode again because the peace process has reached a dead end. The only way the peace process can be revived is by President Clinton and Secretary Albright publicly putting substantive proposals on the table, which the two sides can’t wiggle out of.

Also, in support of your false theory that security allows Jews to fight each other, you say that in times of trouble “survival strategies shaped through millennia dictated cohesion.” Wrong again. Going back two millennia, when the Romans were at the gates of Jerusalem, the zealots, the sicarae and the priestly partisans continued to murder each other.

J. Zel Lurie, Delray Beach, FL

An Organization With Far Too Much Control

To Jack Anderson and Jack Nelson, the Los Angeles Times (as submitted).

Many thanks for your part in the A & E Biography of J. Edgar Hoover which was shown recently on TV. I learned that his misdeeds at the FBI had been a great deal worse than I suspected, but noted with gratitude the pledge made by one of you that the media would never again allow one single person to wield as much power as Mr. Hoover did.

While I know of no individual in the United States who has such enormous control over others, I should like to draw your attention to an organization which is far more powerful than Mr. Hoover ever was: The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). To begin with, the Israeli lobby sees to it that the United States gives that tiny nation more than 13 million dollars a day, every day of the year, and has done so for a long time. (Total since 1949: $84,854,827,200.)

AIPAC didn’t like the secretary-general of the United Nations, so he’s out. The United States blocked the appointment of Egypt’s Boutros Boutros-Ghali to a second term even though our oldest allies—Britain and France—joined all the other Security Council members to produce a 14 to 1 vote to reappoint him.

Why did we bully the Security Council into replacing Boutros Boutros-Ghali, especially since, as far as we were concerned, his performance had been fine? The Israel lobby “persuaded” us to get rid of him because he offered U.N. peacekeepers to protect the residents of Hebron following the massacre of 29 Muslim men and boys at prayer by a Jewish settler.

But that wasn’t all the lobby didn’t like about him: In the spring of 1996, the then U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Madeleine Albright, tried to get Boutros-Ghali to suppress a U.N. report, which had been prepared by Dutch Maj. Gen. Franklin Van Kappen, on the killing of some 100 civilians, including two American children. Those civilians had sought shelter in a U.N. compound at Qana from Israeli shelling and bombing of towns and villages in southern Lebanon. The report, which was subsequently endorsed by Amnesty International, suggested that Israeli artillery men either had purposely targeted the U.N. peacekeepers and the refugees under their protection, or were criminally negligent in the manner in which they aimed the shells that fell in the U.N. compound. That was May 1996. June of 1996 is when the White House announced that it would use its veto to prevent the re-election of Boutros-Ghali to a second term.

Clinton’s arrogance of power outraged other member nations and prompted one U.N. spokesperson to quip that by pursuing the campaign against Boutros-Ghali, Ambassador Albright succeeded in uniting the other 183 members of the U.N. (beside the U.S. and Israel) which no one had ever been able to do before.

AIPAC does not limit its activities to the U.N. It has virtually taken over American foreign policy. State Department Middle East peace negotiator Dennis Ross; his deputy, Aaron David Miller; former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk, who is now assistant secretary of state for Near East affairs, and State Department spokesman James Rubin all just happen to be Jewish. So are the head of the National Security Council, Samuel Berger, and his deputy, James Steinberg, who are the top two foreign policymakers in the White House. Most other assistant secretaries in charge of all six State Department regional bureaus—where day-to-day U.S. foreign policy is conducted—are Jewish, and the Secretary of State herself and the Secretary of Defense are of Jewish ethnic origin.

Would anybody have the chutzpah to claim this is mere coincidence? Can one ever imagine the outcry from Jews if the situation were reversed: that all top U.S. foreign policy positions were filled with Arab Americans?

Name Withheld, Maine

Domestic Political Pressure Has Netanyahu Laughing

To The New York Times, March 10, 1998 (as submitted).

Re: “West Raises Heat on Serbs” by Steven Erlanger (NYT, March 10)

Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has stated that “the only kind of pressure President Milosevic understands is the kind that imposes a real price on his unacceptable behavior” inside his country’s internationally recognized borders. Fine. But is the only kind of pressure Prime Minister Netanyahu understands really the kind that imposes no price more onerous than an unissued invitation to a meal with President Clinton on his unacceptable behavior outside his country’s internationally recognized borders?

No doubt Prime Minister Netanyahu understands such “pressure” perfectly well and has a good laugh at the groveling subservience of the world’s self-styled “sole superpower.” No doubt President Clinton, Secretary Albright and the entire U.S. Congress understand the domestic political pressure that could impose a career-ending price on honorable behavior based on a consistent respect for fundamental principles of international law and human rights rather than simply on who is doing it to whom.

John V. Whitbeck, Paris, France.

Questionable Panel in House

To The Hon. Sam Brownback, Washington, DC, March 11, 1998

Congratulations on your position as chairman of the Subcommittee on Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs. I commend you for scheduling a hearing on developments in the Middle East.

For 16 years I served as a member of the House counterpart to your committee, the last 10 as senior Republican. In fact, Middle East policy remains a deep interest. I spend much of my time promoting a just peace in the region. I am, however, dismayed at the composition of the panels in the March 11 hearings. All but one have strong religious ties to Israel and all are known as partisans for Israeli interests. The one bright spot was the intervention of Henry Siegman, who declared the Palestinians must be given hope of ultimate statehood.

While Israeli interests are vital and must always be considered, the U.S. national interest is not always the same as Israel’s. Beyond that consideration, the interest of Israel’s neighbors, particularly the Palestinian population under Israeli control, should be examined regularly, as should the still broader concerns of Arabs and Muslims generally.

I hope you will soon schedule a second hearing at which the national interests of the United States, including its stake in fair treatment of Arab and Muslim concerns and grievances, can be critically explored.

There are many qualified Americans, including some of Arab ancestry, who could provide important balance to the testimony provided on March 11. I do not present myself as an expert, but I have had long, close experience in this area of inquiry and am available at your convenience.

Sincerely yours, Paul Findley, Jacksonville, IL

Attack Would Be Wrong

To the Newport News-Hampton Virginia, Feb. 25, 1998 (as published).

I have spent 35 years studying the Middle East. I have lived and done research in 20 of the 23 countries. I know the people.

Today, the masses of Arab, Iranian and Turkish people are horrified by the thought that we might unleash a wave of bombings against a nation of suffering people whose only sin is that they are ruled by a despot. Anti-American demonstrations have already begun in Egypt, Yemen, Jordan, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, Syria and Libya. Even the Saudis are deeply concerned, and so too are many of our closest allies in Europe and Asia.

If the administration should go ahead with the military option, Americans will be viewed across the region as the new Mongols, and we will no longer be welcome in the Middle East. Many of my friends are already upset and angered by the 700,000 tons of bombs that we dropped on Iraq in 1990-91. Another technological massacre from the sky will alienate Arabs and Muslims across the world, and we will enter the 21st century under a cloud of hatred.

An attack on Iraq will be devastating to our strategic national interests. It will not dislodge the tyrant nor will it rid Iraq of its weapons and willingness to resist. It will kill many Iraqis and will draw us deeper into the quicksands of the Middle East where we will have to maintain a huge military presence for the indefinite future. Whom will we fight next time? Iraq again? Iran? Is there no one in the administration thinking of the long run? What are the costs and benefits?

Has anyone calculated the financial cost of our presence in the Persian Gulf? We have already fired 112 cruise missiles ($120 million) into Iraq since the Gulf war. Presently, we have another half a billion dollars worth of such missiles ready to unleash on Iraq at any moment. This military adventure will cost the American taxpayer billions of dollars and the Saudis and Kuwaitis have indicated that this time they will not pick up the tab. Finally, and importantly, is there not a moral element involved in these calculations?

We have proven that we have great firepower. Is it not time to use some serious brain power? In many ways, Saddam Hussain would like us to attack. And it appears that we have every intention of playing into his bloody hands. There are other alternatives. The accord just brokered by U.N.Secretary-General Kofi Annan and supported by President Clinton and all our allies is a step in the right direction.

James A. Bill, Director of the Wendy and Emery Reves Center for International Studies, The College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, VA

England Following Unhappy Road of Subservience

To The Hon. Tony Blair, Prime Minister, c/o Embassy of Great Britain, Washington, DC, Feb. 5, 1998

It is interesting to see how people who have never been in wars are so anxious to devastate other countries with them. The innate savagery in human beings (at least in so-called civilized countries) seems to increase with opportunity.

When you consider Israel’s record of racism, total lack of justice toward the owners of the land they have stolen, and contempt for the values of democracy, it is almost laughable if not so tragic to think of the demonization by the West of Iraq.

Since when has it been illegal for countries to defend themselves against their enemies? The rogue state of Israel, either through blackmail or bribes, has been given an arsenal unheard of in the world’s history. Why? It has been a cause of dissension and misery in the Middle East ever since a venal American president set it up in defiance of every protest. Let us demand an inspection and accounting of Israel’s weapons. They have the power and the will to blow away the Middle East and Europe.

It is very sad to see England following the road of subservience to Israel, just like our unhappy country. Presumably Zionist Jewish control of England is equal to the control exercised here but there will be a day of reckoning. You cannot keep people without hope forever under a barbarous regime. Let Iraq work out its own destiny. It has suffered enough from the West. Israel is the real problem in the Middle East, and one that cannot be ignored.

Marion A. Fitch, Washington, DC

On Target

To Insight, Orlando Sentinel,Dec. 7, 1997 (as published).

In his Nov. 30, 1997 column, Charley Reese enunciated the U.S. position on Iraq as presented by the president and the secretary of state in recent public pronouncements.

Here is a writer who calls the shots as he sees them.

The Iraq situation is exacerbated by the fumbling, amateurish foreign policies of this administration and its administrators, namely Bill Clinton, William Cohen and Madeleine Albright.

Roger C. Bowlus, Tavares, FL

No “Civilian” Casualties

To the Albany, NY Times-Union, Feb. 18, 1998 (as submitted).

America began this century with a war. Has there been or is there now any place to which the old men in DC will not send American troops?

The Clinton administration’s disclaimers about civilian casualties are just another instance of the DC crowd’s “shadow” complicity in the genocide that has been and is being carried out against defenseless Arab populations. Military strikes would not even be considered if Iraqi civilians were not Arabs.

Francis Richardson, Greenville, NY

A Matter of Timing

To the Pennsylvania Latrobe Bulletin, Feb. 2, 1998 (as published).

My wife and I wish to commend the Latrobe Bulletin for its balanced coverage of the recent presidential scandal concerning his private life.

The mainline American news media has again demonstrated its disregard for mature coverage of the news by pandering to what it believes its public wants to know about. Two very important foreign affairs issues have been poorly covered, i.e., the Middle East peace talk crisis and the pope’s visit to Cuba—while at the same time we are being kept informed with banner headlines of the minor details of the alleged scandal.

Of course it cannot be proven, but the thought has occurred to me that the mainline media might have seized on this opportunity to “bury” the Palestinian presentation of their side of the Middle East peace talk issue. There might be a hidden agenda behind this recent feeding frenzy by the media to focus on this alleged presidential private scandal. It is to be noted that this coverage of the alleged scandal was initiated just at the time that the Palestinian leader arrived in Washington, and just after the Israeli prime minister departed!

I sense that there is (at long last) a nascent public awareness here in America of the gross injustice that has been the lot of the Palestinian people for over 50 years. I admit that I have long been pro-Palestinian. However, this is not to say that I am anti-Israeli—and certainly not to say that I am anti-Semitic. To be charged with being anti-Semitic in this issue is an oxymoron! The Palestinians also are Semites.

I consider myself to be an old Middle East hand, having lived and worked there for 12 years. I was there, with my family, during the June ’67 war, and ever since then I have become increasingly disappointed that the Israelis have not seriously and fairly negotiated with the Palestinians from the Israeli position of strength. The Western world is well aware of the pro-Israel “tilt” of our successive administrations. The present Israeli government considers our administration to be “in their pocket.”

And finally, there is my concern that our media has been unbalanced in reporting U.S. foreign aid to Israel. For the fiscal year 1997 grants and loan guarantees totaled $5.6758 billion. Israel is by far the largest single recipient of our foreign aid! How much effort does our media make to inform the American public of this fact?

It seems to me that your paper illustrates the old adage that “quality usually comes in small packages!”

Robert L. Ackerman, New Alexandria, PA

Mideast Impasse

To The Washington Post, March 28, 1998 (as published).

In his March 6 op-ed column, “Arafat’s Children,” Charles Krauthammer confuses Chairman Arafat’s obligation to curb violence under the Oslo accords with the right of free expression for the Palestinian people. The burning of flags, people marching and chanting statements unfavorable to Israel and the United States and distasteful newspaper articles constitute freedom of expression, not violence. These actions would be protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution if performed in the United States.

Perhaps if Israel carries out its obligations under the Oslo accords, violence will be avoided. The Oslo accords state in the first article that the aim of the negotiations is a permanent settlement based on U.N. Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338. Resolution 242 of Nov. 22, 1967 emphasizes “the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war...” and calls for the “[w]ithdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict”;...Resolution 338, of Oct. 15, 1973 calls for immediate implementation of Resolution 242.

It is clear to me that the Netanyahu government has no intention of returning to the Palestinians all of the territory Israel occupied in the June 1967 war. Under these circumstances, I do not see how or why Chairman Arafat can or should suppress anti-Israeli rhetoric by Palestinians. Only just and fair actions by Israel toward the Palestinian people can do so.

Milton J. Stickles, Jr., Chevy Chase, MD

Har Homa is a Settlement

To The New York Times, March 30, 1998 (as published).

Contrary to Shmuel Sisso, Israel’s consul general in New York (letter, March 26), Har Homa is a settlement because it is located on land conquered by Israel in 1967. Originally part of the West Bank, this area was annexed to Jerusalem as part of Israel’s unilateral expansion of Jerusalem’s boundaries after the war.

Transfer of the population of an occupying power to the occupied territory is illegal under international law. In addition, Israel’s boundaries for Jerusalem are not recognized internationally. Whether as part of the West Bank or inside Israel’s expanded borders, Har Homa remains a settlement.

Rafat A. Dajani, American Committee on Jerusalem, Washington, DC

West Bank Jewish Settlements are Not “Legal”

To The Hon. Madeleine Albright, Washington, DC, Oct. 17, 1997

I was astonished to learn that on NBC’s “Today” show you told Matt Lauer that although Netanyahu’s plan to build more settlements is “not helpful,” it is “legal.”

Legal? Since when? Settlements have had a long and vociferous condemnation as illegal by the United Nations, and illegality has been their long-standing status in U.S. policy under many presidents.

That settlements are “legal” is an outright distortion of the truth, and saying so was an inexcusable statement on your part.

The United States has been by no means an “honest broker” in the Arab/Israeli conflict. I am ashamed of my country’s blatant favoritism toward Israel and its utter disregard for the rights of the Palestinians whose lands have been usurped by the Israelis as surely as the Serbs usurped Bosnia—not with big guns but with bulldozers and outrageous “laws.”

The American taxpayers have been taken to the cleaners by the Israelis and by Congress, the president and the State Department.

Far from describing settlements as “legal,” under your aegis the State Department should see to it that Israel abides by United Nations resolutions as strictly as you require Iraq to do. These are resolutions which require Israel to disband settlements, to get out of the occupied territories, to return the Golan Heights to Syria, and to get out of Lebanon.

Then and only then can the peace process take hold and defuse the dangerous situation that now exists in the Middle East.

Marion E. Sittler, Washington, DC

Setting the Record Straight

To “This Morning,” CBC Radio, Vancouver, BC, Canada, March 13, 1998

During your show on March 12, Michael Enright erroneously described the city of Jerusalem as being “3,000 years old.” In fact, it is at least 5,000 years old. Jerusalem (originally known as Jebus) was founded by the Canaanites, who were the ancestors of today’s Palestinians, in approximately 3000 bc and its name first appears as “Rushalimum” in Egyptian execration texts of the 19th century bc, more than 800 years before it was occupied by King David. According to Karen Armstrong, acknowledged expert on Jerusalem and author of Jerusalem, One City, Three Faiths (1996), the city’s name “seems to have incorporated the name of the Syrian god Shalem, who was identified with the setting sun or the evening star...and can probably be translated as ‘Shalem has founded.’”

Gary D. Keenan, Vancouver, BC, Canada

Re: Censorship

To Mr. Tom Dvorak, Channel 10/36 TV Station, Milwaukee, WI

I spoke to you recently about showing a film, “People and the Land” by Tom Hayes. I purchased the tape and I found the subject handled honestly and fairly.

Attached is a Journal Sentinel article found on page 4 of the March 13, 1998 edition. Documentaries on controversial subjects are entitled to be shown.

My long-time membership with Channel 10/36 will not be renewed because of this type of censorship.

Back in July 1991 Mr. Bryce Combs censored “Tongues Untied” and I overlooked that. This time I will not as I firmly believe the Palestinians are being treated unfairly.

John L. Hughes, Milwaukee, WI

Palestinian Christians

To the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Dec. 2, 1997 (as published).

Cal Thomas’ Nov. 19 column claims that due to the Palestinian Authority’s persecution of Christians, there has been a massive migration of Christians from the West Bank. He cites as evidence the fact that during the British Mandate period, Bethlehem had a Christian majority of 80 percent.

Does he think your readers will believe that the Palestinian Authority could have caused such a massive change during its two-year rule in Bethlehem?

Rumors alleging persecution of Christians by Muslims are part of the Israeli attempt to divide and rule the Palestinians. In fact, Christian and Muslim Palestinians have always stood together against the Israeli occupation. Palestinian Christian leadership supports the creation of a Palestinian state and Christian leaders have important positions in the Palestinian Authority.

The suffering of Palestinian Christians, which led to their emigration, was caused by the Israeli occupation—loss of their land, jailings, torture, house demolitions, etc. More Christians than Muslims have emigrated from Bethlehem during the Israeli occupation because of social and economic factors, such as better contacts abroad, not because of persecution by Muslims!

Louise Green, Laduc, MO

Israel and Christians

To the Minneapolis Star-Tribune , Jan. 25, 1998 (as published).

Jerry Falwell and other American evangelical Christians are rallying support for the “great state of Israel,” and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is courting that support.

I find it extremely ironic that Christian people would rally to support this oppressive, right-wing Jewish government. Do they not realize that thousands of Christians in the region are Palestinian?

In his day Jesus always rallied to support oppressed minorities, whatever their faith. Today, these same evangelical Christians work hard to help oppressed Christians all over the world. (China, Russia and Egypt are good examples.) How can they turn their backs on the oppressed Christian Palestinians in the occupied territories? And worse, how can they offer encouragement to the oppressors, the Netanyahu government?

The Rev. Erwin C. Barron, Minneapolis, MN

Don’t Apologize for Truth

To the Raleigh, NC News and Observer, “The People’s Forum,” Feb. 3, 1998 (as submitted).

Your Jan. 23 editorial, “More pressure on Israel,” was accurate, and you should not let pressure make you apologize for stating the facts.

Although some Palestinians may be anti-Semitic, so are some Americans. We don’t blame Clinton for the KKK. In November 1975 the London Times reported that the synagogue in Beirut was bombed by the Israeli air force. Does that mean Israel is anti-Semitic?

The article also noted that when this Lebanese Jewish community was caught between Christian and Muslim militias, Arafat sent a crack brigade to protect them. He also sent them food and water to assure their survival.

The real anti-Semites are the fundamentalist Christians who want all Jews to go to Israel and become Christians. My wife quit going to a prayer group because the leader wanted them to pray that Israel kept all the occupied territory so all Jews would go there and Jesus would come again and convert them, or send the un-converted to hell. That is an insult to Jews, an injury to Palestinians, and it is presumptuous to tell Jesus what to do.

(The Rev.) John A. Zunes, Chapel Hill, NC

Editor Writes Back

To Rev. John A. Zunes, Feb. 9, 1998

Thank you for your letter to the editor. Unfortunately, lately we’ve been receiving many more publishable letters than we have room to print. Because of space limitations, we’re not going to be able to use your letter in “The People’s Forum.”

We do appreciate your interest very much.

Allen Torrey, Opinion Page Copy Editor, The News and Observer

Holy Land Is an Unjust Place

To the Buffalo Pioneer Press, Dec. 18, 1997 (as published).

I read Dr. Portnoy’s (Sept. 18) guest essay with great interest, since I resided in the Middle East for 10 weeks last year with my husband, a professor and recipient of a USIA research grant.

The phrase “fairy tale land,” used by Dr. Portnoy, did not describe our experiences in Israel and the West Bank. Our eager anticipation of visiting the “Holy Land” was quickly doused by the bleak realities of the situation. We videotaped the bulldozing of Jabal Abu Ghneim, Palestinian land which was being prepared for the Har Homa settlement and for the development of a tourist enclave (which would deprive Bethlehem Palestinians of this income source).

We met a teenage girl at Al-Liqa, an interfaith center (just steps from the Bethlehem checkpoint) who has been denied permission to visit Jerusalem for the past five years.

The divisiveness among Israelis that Dr. Portnoy describes may be a consequence of the relentless tension in this two-tiered society that results from the pervasive indignities of everyday Palestinian life: from checkpoints, to garbage on the streets (due to inadequate services), to house demolitions, to administrative detention, to the denial of a livelihood.

An Israeli staff member from the Alternative Information Center told us bluntly, “I don’t think that it’s in the best interest of my security to live in a country that is committing war crimes against other people.” The Netanyahu government is thus doubly unjust—both to Palestinians, whose rights are being systematically denied, and to the decent Israeli citizens who witness this intolerable mistreatment.

Cynthia Infantino, Libertyville, NY

Is This Proper Punishment?

To the Orlando Sentinel, March 23, 1998 (as published).

My heart felt heavy when I read about three Palestinian laborers on their way home from work in Israel who were killed last week by Israeli soldiers. My guess is that the soldiers probably were trigger-happy. Instead of punishing the soldiers, the government of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu released them the next day, saying there was no reason to continue holding them. Imagine that happening in America.

It concerns me that Israeli soldiers don’t seem to be really punished when they kill or maim innocent Palestinians. But, then, the Israeli government also carries out injustices.

I urge my fellow Floridians to help the Palestinians in their plight.

Nuha Marchi, Orlando, FL

Good Reporting, Bob!

To Mr. Bob Simon, Jerusalem Bureau, “CBS Evening News,” c/o Station WCCO, Minneapolis, MN, Jan. 2, 1998

Your report tonight on the Lebanese “detainees” was so compelling, but also so typical of your reports from the Middle East over the past two or three years, that I in turn am compelled to congratulate not only you but CBS.

You personally have made a difference in my choice between CBS, ABC, and NBC coverage of the Middle East. The objectivity test used to be easy: ABC, NBC and then CBS—especially if Dan Rather was reporting. I used to question who was writing the Middle East news from CBS—Dan Rather or the owners.

C. Patrick Quinlan, Edina, MN

An Interesting Interview

To the Santa Barbara News-Press , Jan. 15, 1998 (as submitted).

I listened with interest to the recent interview of the president of Iran, Mohammed Khatami, by CNN correspondent Christiane Amanpour. I further listened to the reporting on this interview by the TV networks, the Associated Press and other news agencies.

Several important points of this interview were understandably, albeit inexcusably, not addressed by these news groups plus the Clinton administration.

When President Khatami was asked about Iran’s developing weapons of mass destruction, he pointed out that Iran had signed and is observing the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty; has been inspected several times by the International Atomic Energy Agency; and, in fact, does not even have an operating nuclear power plant. In contrast, Israel has refused to sign this treaty; will not allow inspection of its nuclear plants; and has, as the nations of the world know, nuclear weapons.

He further stated that Iran has not in the past supported terrorists and would not in the future. He aptly pointed out that the state of Israel engages in terrorist activities against the Palestinian people.

A salient point which he brought out, and with which I wholeheartedly agree, is that U.S. foreign policy

vis-á-vis the Middle East is made in Tel Aviv, not in Washington.

Until we change our Middle East policy and make it more even-handed, there will be constant terrorism and fighting on both sides. This could be done by cutting off our annual six billion dollar gift to Israel and by refusing to veto Security Council resolutions aimed at Israel.

I would suggest that a correct solution which we could impose on Israel is their complete pullout from Gaza, the West Bank and Golan Heights, with the concomitant demilitarizing of these lands by the Palestinians and the Syrians.

Elden T. Boothe, Los Olivos, CA

The Intentions Are Known

To President Bill Clinton, Washington, DC, Jan. 17, 1998

As evident from recent events in the Middle East, Israel has no intention, nor ever has had peaceful intentions with the Palestinians. How can we be so blind with our support for Israel in the United Nations?

Please show some leadership by declaring the United States will honestly and fairly re-examine our Middle East policy to put a stop to these events which will bring on war. This will surely involve the lives of our sons and daughters.

Please read the attached photocopy of p. 209 from Chapter 20, entitled “Journey to Jerusalem,” of the excellent book by Grace Halsell entitled, In Their Shoes.

John L. Hughes, Milwaukee, WI