ISRAEL 3-23-2008

23, March 2008                      ISRAEL (Response to local letter writer) 

         

In his letter of March 22, Desmond Tuck, offers some skewed statistics which demand a response. It is not surprising that the majority of Palestinians support their democratically elected government’s anger over the wanton killing of its innocent civilians. Overwhelming force, with the latest U.S. high-tech weapons, has been used to kill and maim hundreds of Palestinian civilians. In the past two-week Israeli forces invaded Gaza by land and air killing 126 people, mostly civilians including 24 children. Tuck, and other letter writers supporting Israel, are very loose and selective on using the word ‘terrorism’.

Theft of Palestinian land, demolitions of their homes, destruction of hundreds of olive trees, denying Palestinian free access to schools and clinics are all acts of terrorism. The destruction of the basic infrastructure of Gaza was an act of terrorism. Halting food supplies to starving Palestinians, withholding electricity and fuel shipments are acts of terrorism. Aerial arracks killing innocent civilians are acts of terrorism. Arbitrary arrests of innocent civilians, torturing them and tossing them into medieval dungeons are acts of terrorism. 

Hard liners such as Rabbi David Shalem, director of the Institute of Talmud Studies at the Mercaz Harav yeshiva in Jerusalem, called for the Ehud Olmert government to attack Palestinians “everywhere, in Gaza, and the north and inside.” 

This yeshiva vigorously opposes any form of Palestinian sovereignty and seeks the theft of Palestinian land by terrorizing or killing its rightful occupants.

Footnotes:

Gideon Levy, columnist of Haaretz wrote a stinging indictment of Mercaz Harav in his March 10 article in Haaretz.  

This yeshiva vigorously opposes any form of Palestinian sovereignty and seeks the theft of Palestinian land by terrorizing or killing its rightful occupants. Thus, a creeping annexation (a term used by Gen. Moshe Dayan) has been an official Israeli policy since its founding.
With complete disdain for international law, Israel announced plans to expand yet another settlement, Givat Ze’ev, five miles from central Jerusalem, which invoked a strong rebuke from Condeleeza Rice.