Dear Queen Rania

Dear Queen Rania,

I read this report and I wish to convey to you my thoughts, which I have taken the liberty of interspersing in your remarks made at Yale for convenience:

1)

In Jordan, where nearly a third of the population is composed of Palestinian refugees,

I would suggest that actually, 70% of Jordan's population is "Palestinian-rooted" (refugees is a trick) and ever more truthful, Jordan itself didn't exist in history as a separate entity except when it was included as part as the territory of Mandate Palestine in 1923.




2)

In the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza...Palestinians must carry IDs that limit their movement and their potential...In contrast, she noted, the IDs that Yale students carry actually give them access - to the dining halls and libraries, to their education and their diplomas.

That's unfair. All Israelis,, Jews and non-Jews, carry IDs. My ID won't get me into Yale's library either.

3)

[in] the West Bank...400 kilometers of walls are going up.

Walls? Some 90% fence, actually.

4)

All traffic is stopped, from people on foot to cars and trucks to ambulances. The wait can be hour...

I also wait for a long time, for example, when some careelss Arab crashes his car into another on the stretch of road between Hizma and Adam or when there is a security alert and everything slows down going through the checkpoint - yes, we Jewish residents als go through checkpoints.

5)

...Palestinians feel humiliated and degraded when asked by armed Israeli soldiers for their ID, which is akin to being told, "Show me proof that you exist," Queen Rania said.

No, it simply indicates where you live so that the security person knows how to react to you, if as a potential suicide bomber or regular terrorist.



6)

One Gaza resident, she revealed, compared his homeland to "a jail where no prisoner knows the length of his sentence."

Actually, he holds the ticket to his "jail cell". Let him influence Hamas to make peace, not adhere to the total eradication of Israel and the killing of its Jews.

7)

The Palestinians' sense of hopelessness and degradation is "compounded by the sense that no one cares, that the outside world is oblivious" to their hardships...

The Pals. are the most known about case of all the world's populations claiming problems, many of which are much more numerous.

8)

"But let me be clear: It isn't just the lives of Palestinians at stake. Israelis too need a future of peace and security," she continued.

That statement is encouraging as is this one:

"We decry the actions of Israeli extremists, but must work harder to rein in our own," she said.

(The full text of Queen Rania's address at Yale can be found here)