November 22: Wrong focus
By JERUSALEM POST READERS
11/21/2012 22:31
Do Hamas newspapers print stories on how Israeli citizens have suffered as a direct result of the ongoing missile barrages?
Letters Photo: REUTERS
Wrong focus
Sir, – News flash to The Jerusalem Post and to the Shaheen family:
In “No wedding bells in Gaza” (November 20), nowhere is it mentioned that the
reason Israel is sending missiles to Gaza is in defense of the Israeli people
who have been bombarded for years by the rockets sent from there! If I had read
such an article in a paper other than one that originates in Israel, I might
have been frustrated by the lack of balance.
But from here in Israel! I’m
outraged.
Go tell the bride to complain to her terrorist compatriots who,
as Golda Meir once said, hate our children more than they love their
own.
Jerusalem Post, shame on you.
SUSAN KATZ
Efrat
Sir, – I was
disgusted reading “No wedding bells in Gaza.”
In the midst of a war this
is not the kind of article to print. We should rally against the enemy and
encourage our leaders not to hold back because of a single soppy story about one
particular Gazan.
We did not choose to harm civilians first, so Gazans
shouldn’t be surprised if we respond and attack even harder. Yara Shaheen’s
complaints should be directed toward her leaders, not ours.
And by the
way, Israeli brides also need to postpone their weddings right now. The war is
twosided, but the article is not.
BONNIE WEINBERG
Nof Ayalon
Sir, – I
find it disconcerting that while our government and army are engaged in a war to
defend our brethren in Sderot, Ashkelon, Tel Aviv and Jerusalem from missile
attacks, you decide to print a human interest story of a distressed bride-to-be
in Gaza.
I’m just curious: Do Hamas newspapers print stories on how
Israeli citizens have suffered over the past several years as a direct result of
the ongoing missile barrages?
PINCHAS GERBER
Karnei Shomron
Symetrical warfare
Sir, – With regard to “EU asserts Israel’s right to ‘proportional’ self defense,
calls for immediate end to violence” (November 20), there’s that word
again.
I went to the dictionary and looked up “proportional.” One of the
definitions had to do with symmetry. I suggest that Kathryn Ashton and her
followers in the EU, UN and elsewhere stop speaking (and thinking) in
cliches.
If we behave “proportionally,” we surely are allowed to bomb
cities in Gaza, as they are doing to us. Or did I miss something?
THELMA
JACOBSON
Petah Tikva
Sir, – A Hamas rocket hits a building in Israel, causing
casualties and damage. An Israeli strike hits a building in Gaza, causing
casualties and damage. Would that be considered “proportional,” or is it a
question of numbers?
GERALD SCHOR
Ra’anana
Land is the key
Sir, – Michael
Sussman (“Hamas’s political wartime gains,” Comment & Features, November 20)
explains that Hamas is in a win-win situation because it is willing to
demonstrate its credibility by attacking usurping Zionists, whatever the cost.
In a sense, Gaza under Hamas has become a collective suicide bomber.
How
to defeat it? A core belief in Islamic theology is the idea that the world is
divided between dar-el-Harb, or the land of war, and dar-el-Islam, the land of
Islam. It is the duty of a jihadist to wage war against darel- Harb until all
land is dar-el- Islam.
To a Muslim, victory means taking land from the
infidel, and defeat means losing it to the infidel. It is therefore essential
that Israel lower Hamas’s status in the eyes of fellow Muslims.
The way
to do that is to take away land.
Whether Israel replants the former
settlements or carves out a buffer zone, it must do something with the land to
achieve victory and demoralize this evil aggressor. Every square inch taken from
Hamas is one more reclaimed for civilization.
DAVID KATCOFF
Jericho,
Vermont
Stick to medicine
Sir, – Johannes van der Heide of Amsterdam had a lot
to say (“Readers from abroad weigh in on Pillar of Defense,” Letters, November
20). It’s just a pity that none of it was relevant or on point to the situation
at hand.
Van der Heide cites everything from terrorists and fascists to a
bad peace being better than a good war. Would Dutch citizens be okay with being
shot at daily? Dr. Van der Heide, I suggest you stick to medicine, for which you
might be better suited, rather than to philosophical conversations that are way
off point.
COOKIE SCHWAEBER-ISSAN
Gizo
Sir, – Reader Johannes van der
Heide asserts that the majority of Israelis and Palestinians support a two-state
solution.
It is essential to understand that the basic philosophies of
organizations such as Hamas and Fatah are not commensurate with the survival of
the Jewish state. Their charters are publicly available and should be read by
all interested parties.
For a brief and decisive summary of the real
situation, please take a look at the logos of these organizations. It stands to
reason that if they have Israel as a central feature of their logos, it is
transparently indicative of their resolute aims and ambitions.
GIDEON
HACK
Zichron Ya’acov
Collective punishment
Sir, – Susan Hattis Rolef (“Shylock
and pigheadedness,” Think About It, November 19) criticizes Israeli policy as
“punishing the Palestinians collectively in the name of security.”
Unfortunately, she fails to recognize that international law prohibiting
collective punishment applies only to criminal convictions and punishment for
crimes that group members did not personally commit.
Just as a government
has a responsibility to serve its citizens, the electorate must also take
responsibility for the government it empowers. A population cannot claim to be
absolved of all blame for the actions of the government it
elected.
Palestinian voters who supported either Hamas or the PA in the
last election did not elect their representatives solely to keep the streets
clean. They knew that Hamas stood for violent “resistance” and the annihilation
of the neighboring Jewish state.
The degradation of living conditions as
the result of acts committed by a people’s government is not only permissible,
it is perfectly reasonable. If Palestinians truly object to Hamas’s terrorist
ways and the PA’s intransigence, they must replace their current
leaders.
Failing that, they are complicit in their governments’
activities and may expect to pay the price.
EFRAIM A. COHEN
Zichron
Ya’acov
Sir, – “Shylock and pigheadedness” was worthy of the anti-Semitic
screeds of Hamas – or, for that matter, Der Sturmer. All that was lacking was an
accompanying cartoon of Israeli officials as hook-nosed demons wielding bloody
knives against innocent Arabs.
Building homes for Jewish citizens in
disputed territories is “not much different” from Shylock’s demand for a pound
of flesh? The “policy of relentlessly punishing the Palestinians collectively in
the name of security for Israel’s Jewish citizens” is merely bloody, merciless
vindictiveness – again, like Shylock? The implication is that there is no real
threat at all, simply a fictitious excuse for Israeli cruelty.
Perhaps in
Rolef’s parallel universe Israel has heartlessly, irrationally (or
“pigheadedly”) deprived Gazans of food, water and electricity. Perhaps their
duly elected rulers have never lobbed a single missile into Israel. If we
weren’t so pigheaded, we would simply follow the wise and merciful teachings of
our betters, the Western democracies, and then there would be
peace.
SARAH GILEAD
Nesher