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: Dear Mr. Bennet: : The recent events in the Middle East have drawn a lot of media coverage. Unfortunately, I feel that our government’s policies are unjustifiably tilting in favor of Israel. I understand that you have a conservative view on this issue and are a strong supporter of Israel. I have noticed your previous pro-Israel rhetoric. But I feel so strongly in my conscience about this that I hope you don’t mind giving me a few minute to listen to my opinion. As an important conservative leader, I plead you to examine this and, if you will, to speak up for the Palestinians and for justice. : I am a person with no inherent bias for either of the parties in this conflict. However, it is abundantly clear to me that the Palestinians have been suffering tremendously since the establishment of the current Israel and later the 1967 war. Millions of them have lost their lands and homes to the Jews, and in the process, many of them were also killed and wounded. Today, their homeland is still under occupation and they are regularly treated inhumanely and humiliatingly. Further more, over the years, the building of more and more Jewish settlements makes them feel that Israel will never return the land to them. Nobody has right to do this to other people. Not s, not Israelis. Put an Israeli in Palestinians’ position, will he fight back? How if someone do this to us Americans? : Archeologically and historically, it is true that Jews were in that region before, but so were Arabs. There had not been a Jewish state since the Roman time, which is a very long time ago. Most of them had moved away over time. They could not just come back, drive the people out and claim the land. Is it acceptable that Indians coming back to Manhattan now to chase the current residents away and taking over the land by force (uming they are militarily strong and also have a very powerful foreign country supporting them)? Of course not, and Indians were there only 300 years ago. Jews could come back after the WWII peacefully to live with Arabs by purchasing lands and obeying the laws. Coming by force and violence, if we don’t call it wrong, how else will we call it? If we don’t call this injustice for Palestinians, how else will we call it? : In the ‘60s, someone fixed the term “terrorism” on the Palestinian movement, even though they were really fighting for their survival, dignity and freedom by using any available means. Their actions must be looked at in the light of their half-century of suffering and their calls for justice being ignored and suppressed by the rest of the world. Terrorism does not apply to the people whose country is occupied. Yes, sometimes their means were ugly, but they were desperate to fight against an overwhelming power. And, we all know, the Israelis fight dirty too. : A terrorist is someone who intentionally hurts other innocent people for his own pleasure or unjustified gain. Acts like highway random shooting are terrorism. But acts like Palestinian suicide bombing, a person sacrificing himself to win justice for himself and his fellow people, are courageous and noble, even if they should not be encouraged. Yes, innocent Israelis have been killed and we all hate to see that, but they did have collectively committed atrocity on the Palestinians for many years. Today, even the Palestinian women are willing to give up their lives to protest the tyranny of Israel. If one day your wife or daughter did the same thing, it must be for a very desperate cause and not just for their personal pleasure, right? : The current intensity of the Palestinian uprising is not because Israel has been too “soft”, it is the opposite. It is because the Israel has been dragging their feet in the return of the land and the continuous construction of the settlements in the midst of Palestinians. Add on top of that, the Israel’s harsh oppression with America’s silent concurrence; the Palestinians naturally feel that they will never get a fair deal from the Israelis. : Over more than 50 years, they had been patiently waiting for United Nations to work, had tried peaceful demonstrations and had waited for Oslo and Madrid agreement to take effect to give them a Palestinian State. But Israel has consistently denied them. Not only are (were) Sharon, Netanyahu and Begin heartless; even Rabin, Peres and Barak were deably unfair toward the Palestinians too. It is really not difficult for an outsider to appreciate their (and entire Arab world’s) frustration and anger. : Yes, the recent bombing attacks were horrible (really, all attacks are bad), and the pain and anguish felt by Israelis are very understandable. But, if Israelis felt hurt because of the bombing, they really should also take one moment to think how excruciating the Palestinian suffering must have been for such a long time. : Israeli Government’s call for Palestinians to stop violence before starting peace negotiation is as ridiculously laughable as tragically sad. How can you ask Palestinians to accept what you have done to them first and go into a negotiation that you’ve clearly shown you are not going to give much? Also, how can the Israeli Government believe the Palestinian uprising can be stopped by destroying the “terror infrastructure”? The opposition is deep in the gr roots, not just by a few “crazy” people. Israel is now practicing the tactic during the WWI: every time a German solider was killed by the resistance, they would shoot 10 villagers as retaliation. The s could have called it anti-terrorism too. The s failed, Israelis will too. : Currently, because of the unbalanced media coverage in the US, the majority of the Americans still favor Israel. I doubt this situation will last too long because it is unnatural. It is already clear for many people in Europe and other parts of the world that the current situation in Palestine is very unjust. The sympathy for the Palestinians continues to grow. America should not, and does not need to, be on the oppressor’s side. It is morally wrong and it is doomed to fail in the long run. : Israel is a democracy, but only for Jews; they have been cruel to the Palestinians. Arafat and Palestinian Authority may be unsophisticated, corrupt and incompetent, but their people’s suffering is real. We Americans have always stood up for the right and just causes, and for the oppressed and defenseless people, like we did in Bosnia and Kosovo. We cannot not do it here. The terrible 9-11 attack on America was very wrong and unjustifiable; but if we continue blindly the pro-Israel policy, we are just driving more Arabs to join the extremist groups. The security for our homeland will be unattainable no matter how much money we spend. Is this a price worth of paying for an unjust cause? I certainly don’t think so. The Arab world can be our friend, don’t make it our enemy. : When we saw the devastating destruction in Jenin (also in other West Bank towns) by Israel on TV, everyone with a heart felt stunned and saddened. The Israeli Army destroyed houses, shops and streets, and killed civilians, including women and children, indiscriminately. It is not to catch the “terrorists”, it is to terrorize the entire population. With this kind of brutality in display, then, how could American Government only demand Arafat to condemn the previous day’s suicide bombing at an Israel bus stop and not dare to blame the Israeli Government? That demand left me flabbergasted! : I, like most Americans, am keenly aware of certain interest groups’ strong influence on the US Middle East policies. The White House and the Congress have been especially obliged to this influence to the extreme degree. But, a leader should do the right thing, even though it is difficult. Otherwise, you will lose the faith of the American people and the trust and respect from other countries. It is detrimental to our long term national strategic interest. Israel may be our strategic partner, but they actions in effect are devastating our strategic interests in that region and undermining our credibility around the world. Eventually, we have to realize that supporting Israel in the current way is wrong and unsustainable. : Israelis are saying that they have the right for self-defense. Don’t Palestinians have the same right? And they have been saying that with their actions. Israelis need to understand that great injustice can’t last forever, and it never did. They can’t stay on full alert and continue to suppress the other people forever. I doubt that even the hard line Israelis believe their current policy will lead to a good result. They knew how it felt to be oppressed and discriminated against; then, they should not do it to others. The Israelis are smart and hard working people and we all recognize, admire and respect that; but on this issue, they are simply wrong. : The Israelis should apologize, reconcile with the Palestinians, give back their land at least to the 1967 line and compensate the refugees; then, maybe reconciliation will become possible. That is the only right thing to do. : Sincerely, : C. P. Lin : P.S.: I am also attaching an article written by a Jewish woman. I hope it will help too. : Quest for Justice : Issue No. 112 -October 2000 : Judith Stone : I am a Jew. I was a participant in the rally for the Right of Return to Palestine. It was the right thing to do. I’ve heard about the European holocaust against the Jews since I was a small child. I’ve visited the memorials in Washington, DC and Jerusalem dedicated to Jewish lives lost, and I’ve cried at the recognition to what level of atrocity mankind is capable of sinking. : Where are the Jews of conscience? No righteous malice can be held against the survivors of Hitler’s holocaust. These fragments of humanity were in no position to make choices beyond that of personal survival. We must not forget that being a survivor or a co-religionist of the victims of the European holocaust does not grant dispensation from abiding by the rules of humanity. “Never again” as a motto rings hollow when it means “never again to us alone.” : My generation was raised being led to believe that the biblical land was a vast desert inhabited by a handful of impoverished Palestinians living with their camels and eking out a living in the sand. The arrival of the Jews was touted as a tremendous benefit to these desert dwellers. Golda Mier even ured us that there “is no Palestinian problem.” : We know now this picture wasn’t as it was painted. Palestine was a land filled with people who called it home. There were thriving towns and villages, schools and hospitals. There were Jews, Christians and Muslims. In fact, prior to the occupation, Jews represented a mere 7% of the population and owned only 3% of the land. : Taking the blinders off for a moment, I see a second atrocity perpetuated by the very people who should be exquisitely sensitive to the suffering of others. These people knew what it felt like to be ordered out of their homes at gunpoint and forced to march into the night to unknown destinations or face execution on the spot. The people who displaced the Palestinians knew firsthand what it meant to watch your home go up in flames, to surrender everything dear to your heart at a moment’s notice. Bulldozers leveled hundreds of villages, along with the remains of the village inhabitants, the old and the young. This was nothing new to the world. : Poland is a vast graveyard of the Jews of Europe. Israel is the final resting place of the macred Palestinian people. A short distance from the memorial to the Jewish children lost to the holocaust in Europe, there is a leveled parking lot. Under this parking lot is what’s left of a once-flourishing village and the bodies of men, women and children whose only crime was taking up needed space and not leaving graciously. This particular burial marker reads: Public Parking. : I’ve talked with Palestinians. I have yet to meet a Palestinian who hasn’t lost a member of their family to the Israeli Shoah, nor a Palestinian who cannot name a relative or friend languishing under inhumane conditions in an Israeli prison. Time and time again, Israel is cited for human rights violations to no avail. On a recent trip to Israel, I visited the refugee camps inhabited by a people who have waited 52 years in these “temporary” camps to go home. Every Palestinian grandparent can tell you the name of their village, their street and where the olive trees were planted. Their grandchildren may never have been home, but they can tell you where their great-grandfather lies buried and where the village well stood. : The press has fostered the portrait of the Palestinian terrorist. But, the victims who rose up against human indignity in the Warsaw Ghetto are called heroes. Those who lost their lives are called martyrs. The Palestinian who tosses a rock in desperation is a terrorist. : Two years ago I drove through Palestine and watched intricate sprinkler systems watering lush green lawns of Zionist settlers in their new condominium complexes, surrounded by armed guards and barbed wire in the midst of a Palestinian community where there was not adequate water to drink and the surrounding fields were sandy and dry. University professor Moshe Zimmerman reported in the Jerusalem Post (30 April 1995), “The [Jewish] children of Hebron are just like Hitler’s youth.” : We Jews are suing for restitution, lost wages, compensation for homes, land, slave labour and back wages in Europe. Am I a traitor of a Jew for supporting the right of return of the Palestinian refugees to their birthplace and compensation for what was taken that cannot be returned? The Jewish dead cannot be brought back to life and neither can the Palestinian macred be resurrected. : David Ben Gurion said, “Let us not ignore the truth among ourselves...politically, we are the aggressors and they defend themselves...The country is theirs, because they inhabit it, whereas we want to come here and settle down, and in their view we want to take away from them their country...” : Palestine is a land that has been occupied and emptied of its people. It’s cultural and physical landmarks have been obliterated and replaced by tidy Hebrew signs. The history of a people was the first thing eradicated by the occupiers. The history of the indigenous people (only 52 years old) has been all but eradicated as though they never existed. And all this has been hailed by the world as a miraculous act of God. : We must recognize that Israel’s existence is not even a question of legality so much as it is an fait accompli realized through the use of force while supported by the Western powers. The United Nations missions directed at Israel in attempting to correct its violations have thus far been futile. : In Hertzl’s “The Jewish State”, the father of Zionism said, “...We must investigate and take possession of the new Jewish country by means of every modern expedient.” : I guess I agree with Ehud Barak (3 June 1998) when he said, “If I were a Palestinian, I’d also join a terrorist group. I’d go a step further, perhaps. Rather than throwing little stones in desperation, I’d hurl a boulder.” : Hopefully, somewhere deep inside, every Jew of conscience knows that this was no war; that this was not God’s restitution of the holy land to it’s rightful owners. We know that a human atrocity was and continues to be perpetuated against an innocent people who couldn’t come up with the arms and money to defend themselves against the Western powers bent upon their demise as a people. : We cannot continue to say, “But what were we to do?” Zionism is not synonymous with Judaism. I wholly support the rally of the Right of Return of the Palestinian people.

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