The story that I allude to is all about pretending: pretending that the emperor is actually wearing royal robes when in fact he is wearing nothing at all. The swindler tailors have told the king’s subjects that anyone who sees otherwise is merely stupid and incompetent. Finally, a child speaks the truth and the bubble bursts. The charade is over.
Why do our Israeli leaders operate under the pretense that they actually have someone to negotiate with, someone whose interests are the same as Israel’s? When will this nonsense end, and who will finally have the guts to speak the truth? Anyone?
Eileen Shapero
(Via E-Mail)
Disunity Kills
We Jews are divided into numerous factions, from far left to far right and from secularists to haredim, with many fine nuances in between.
Sadly, we don’t just disagree on minor issues; we harbor intense dislike and hostility for each other. In Israel that hostility has devolved into actual violence. Despite our long history of pogroms, expulsions and mass murder culminating with the Shoah in our own time, we have not learned the lesson that we are all equally Jews and must get along, respecting each other and compromising with those whose views differ from our own.
Our enemies do not differentiate; they hate all Jews. And with so many enemies, the last thing we need is this mindless infighting. Enemies within our own ranks are harder to accept and more difficult to deal with than outside enemies.
It is imperative that we face our common Jewish problems as well as our common anti-Semitic enemies with achdut, unity.
Charlotte Wahle
New York, NY
In Their Own Words…
Many well-meaning people have decided that if Israel were to return to its pre-June 1967 borders, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict would end.
When I ask advocates of this concept how they arrived at this conclusion, I receive answers such as “the Palestinians only want the area that was allocated to them in the UN vote.” These people either are unaware of Palestinian documents and speeches that call for the destruction of Israel or they don’t want to believe these very revealing facts.
I have met other advocates who were not aware of the fact that the PLO and its charter to destroy Israel were created in 1964 when Israel was within its pre-1967 borders. Not one person was aware of the fact that Abbas’s Fatah party also created and issued a constitution calling for the elimination of Israel when Israel was within its 1967 borders. Neither of these formal documents has ever been modified to eliminate clauses calling for the destruction of Israel.
Not one person with whom I have spoken was aware of organizations like PMW (Palestinian Media Watch) and MEMRI (Middle East Media Research Institute). These two groups monitor Palestinian Authority media and TV and provide a continuous flow of fully documented translations of Palestinian leaders glorifying and praising Palestinian terrorists as heroes.
PMW and MEMRI have presented us with evidence of Palestinian leaders comparing peace agreements with Israel to Muhammad’s 10-year peace treaty with the Quairish tribe, which he destroyed two years after he signed the treaty. They also have documented Palestinian leaders’ statements to the effect that a successful frontal attack against Israel is not possible and therefore they will try to destroy Israel in phases.
How can any objective person, once he or she is aware or made aware of these salient facts, continue to think that a return to pre-June1967 borders is the solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict?
William K. Langfan
Palm Beach, FL