...is both internally argumentative and habitually intransigent, has not provided much confidence in the chances of even a provisional compromise, especially as settlers continue to build in East Jerusalem and the West Bank.
when we know that Jerusalem is not a "settlement" and to describe it as such is simply adopting the Palestinian narrative that denies Jewish national connections to its 3000-year old capital
and refers to
Palestinian incitement and Israeli belligerence
thus equalizing two different matters, besides ignoring Arab terror acts
and proposes an absurd balance of dependence of Israel's
...future as a Jewish democratic state depends on the creation of a peaceful, democratic and stable Palestinian state by its side
and would have us accept a racist proposal which is not to be applied to Israel which must continue to maintain a 20% Arab presence in the state by writing
...no Palestinian state will emerge on a West Bank blanketed with settlements, and the future of the larger, more far-flung settlements must ultimately be decided by a negotiated agreement.
among other nonsensical comment on the situation.
Then these leters were published and I am thankful to Petrushka, Dishler and Rapp and am embarassed for Bronstein:-
To the Editor:
Re “Good News From the Middle East (Really)” (Op-Ed, Jan. 26):
Kudos to Jeffrey Goldberg and Hussein Ibish for presenting a refreshingly optimistic, balanced and moderate view of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. May the Israeli and Palestinian governments follow the advice recommended by the two commentators en route to the long-awaited compromise between the two peoples.
Yitzhak Bronstein, New York
•
To the Editor:
The major flaw in Jeffrey Goldberg and Hussein Ibish’s analysis is the assumption that a two-state solution demands a Palestine free of Jews. That does not leave a warm and fuzzy feeling with many Israelis and their supporters about the future neighborliness of the new state.
Second, such an outcome is impossible to achieve for a whole host of logistical, political and religious reasons. A Palestine free of Jews is a show stopper.
Menachem Petrushka, Flushing, Queens
To the Editor:
This very long essay giving the joint perspective of an Arab and a Jew on the prospects of finally settling the Israeli-Palestinian conflict does a good job of reviewing the multitude of strategic and political perspectives involved from both sides. But it doesn’t stress enough a fundamental problem: the continuing systematic indoctrination of Palestinian and Arab youth with a distorted religious and racial view of Israelis and Jews.
Since Israel’s founding in 1948 and up to the present, textbooks and other educational materials in Palestinian schools and in schools throughout the Arab world have been filled with anti-Semitic distortions and propaganda, essentially ensuring that continuing generations of Arab youth grow up hating Israel and Jews. Many of the weekly Friday sermonizers at Arab mosques continue to spew forth venomous anti-Israel and anti-Semitic diatribes, reinforcing a maniacal hatred of Jews.
There is no comparable institutionalized demonization of anyone occurring among the vast majority of the democratic Israeli society.
“The softening of hearts” that Jeffrey Goldberg and Hussein Ibish correctly recognize as an ultimate requirement for a lasting, peaceful resolution of this conflict will not likely occur until this basic flaw is corrected.
Jerry Rapp, New York
To the Editor:
I wish I could be as optimistic as Jeffrey Goldberg and Hussein Ibish regarding peace between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. The only scenario that they didn’t discuss and that haunts me is the possibility of Hamas’s winning an election in the West Bank after Israel recognizes a Palestinian state.
Hamas does not recognize Israel’s right to exist and is heavily armed by Iran. A repeat of the Gaza takeover would be intolerable.
Bernard Dishler, Upper Gwynedd, Pa.
Of course, we should be thankful to Ibish for this analysis from 2005 about the failure of Arab governments to help the Arabs of the territory of the former Mandate of Palestine:
...The outrageous and shameful behaviour of the government of Lebanon, my home country, towards its own Palestinian refugee population would probably be exhibit A, excluded as they are from so many professions, hemmed into some of the most wretched refugee camps in the entire world. There are many other key examples, of course, including the expulsion of Palestinians from Libya and Kuwait, one could go on and on. I doubt anyone in this audience is unaware of this sorry record. It's a sad but true commentary and one that we need to face up to, that Palestinians living in my adopted country, the United States, have more rights than they do in any Arab state. Worse still, Arab governments have consistently encouraged the Palestinian national movement to adopt a set of self-defeating strategies in the pursuit of national liberation. While almost all Arab states have developed pragmatic policies of their own towards Israel, they have promoted political stridency and militant rhetoric among Palestinians, encouraging them to live in a fantasy world in which a simplistic formula of armed struggle, steadfastness, you have to love these buzz words, steadfastness, and worst of all, the very worst buzz word of all, martyrdom, are framed as a serious response to the incredibly complex challenges facing Palestinian national liberation. Many Arab governments have uncompromisingly championed the Palestinian cause with words, of course, only with words, encourage Palestinians to confront the vastly more powerful Israelis alone and virtually unarmed, and then fetishised images of dead and dying Palestinians on satellite television, while fearing and mistreating Palestinians, live Palestinians, in their own states, and at the same time doing all sorts of business, whether openly or covertly, with Israel. In effect, many Arab governments have been willing and committed to fight the Israelis till the last Palestinian.
Ibish has been dished by CAMERA previously.
As for Goldberg, the second author of the original op-ed, well, he was disappointing. The less said, the better for him.
^
Posts
1 comment:
Thanks so much for your article, quite helpful material.
Post a Comment