Bush's Israel policy is outrageous 3-29-2004

29, March 2004 Bush's Israel policy is outrageous
The illegal settlements were built in gross violation of U.N. sanctions, and Israel has shown its contempt for international law by refusing to implement 28 U.N. Security Council resolutions and several General Assembly resolutions calling for Israel to withdraw from Arab lands. The brutal assassinations of two Hamas leaders along with scores of civilians were another clear violation of International law. This blatant partiality and continued financial support to Israel will serve as a death sentence to hundreds of Israelis and Palestinians and will expose all Americans to danger.

Pouring fuel onto a roaring inferno is the grand finale of the "road map to peace." I urge all readers who support peace and justice to contact their elected officials and demand that our tax dollars not be used to support state-sponsored terrorism.

Israel assassinates Hamas leader 3-27-2004

27, March 2004                    Israel assassinates Hamas leader

The assassination of the Hamas leader, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, is a clear violation of international law, roundly condemned by most of the world, including the United Nations. Perhaps some of your readers may not be aware that the Hamas leader was held in a maximum security Israeli prison. Why then was he released? There is growing body of evidence that Tel Aviv gave financial aid to Hamas for many years. “Israel aided Hamas directly - as a counterbalance to the PLO”- Tony Cordesman, Middle East analyst for the Center for Strategic Studies.  Brigadier General Yithaq, the former military governor of Gaza, had publicly stated that he had help fund “Islamic movements such as Hamas as a counterweight to the PLO”. The highly respected Jewish scholar, Dr. Susan Green, confirmed Israel’s complicity in a recent interview with Dennis Bernstein of KPFA. Why would Israel fund a terror organization such as Hamas?

The answer is self-evident. Israel has never been serious in negotiating peace with the moderate faction of the Palestinian Authority. Thus, the lives of Israeli men, women and children have been sacrificed at the altar of this immoral and reprehensible policy. The illegal occupation of Palestine, land theft in the form of illegal settlements, the apartheid wall which has further expropriated land and trapped Palestinians in tight enclaves, checkpoints to protect illegal settlements - have collectively fueled Palestinian rage and a strong desire for revenge.

Unless we can persuade our government to stop funding Israeli state sponsored terrorism, more of our precious Israeli and Palestinian brothers, sisters and children will perish.

Israel 3-7-2004

7, March 2004 Response to local letter writers RE: Israel
Sheree Roth (PA Daily Thursday March 4), Rachel Reznichenko and David Meir-Levi (Daily March 7) all seem to be troubled that the cruel, sadistic policies of the Israeli government are finally receiving much needed media attention. If indeed the wall is needed to protect Israel from suicide bombers, then why not construct the wall on the Israeli side of the border? A Power Point presentation given at Stanford yesterday by Dr. Barghouti, exposes the myth that the wall is being constructed for security purposes. It shows the wall meandering deep inside Palestine, expropriating huge swaths of land and isolating whole villages. According to the U.N., the partially constructed fence already puts 16% of the West Bank and 13,000 Palestinians on the Israeli side!. A startling new fact emerged from Barghouti's presentation. Israeli is now planning to build an eastern wall to further hem in the Palestinians. Compounding the suffering, is the Israeli checkpoints through which Palestinians must pass.

These checkpoints have been strategically located to protect illegal Israeli settlements. Strip searches, denial of health services and myriad of other indignities have been heaped on the civilian population at these checkpoints. I sincerely hope the International Court will censure Israel and focus more world attention on the sad plight of the Palestinians.

Israel 3-7-2004

7, March 2004                        Response to local letter writer RE: Israel

Sheree Roth (PA Daily Thursday March 4), Rachel Reznichenko and David Meir-Levi (Daily March 7) all seem to be troubled that the cruel, sadistic policies of the Israeli government are finally receiving much needed media attention. If indeed the wall is needed to protect Israel from suicide bombers, then why not construct the wall on the Israeli side of the border? A Power Point presentation given at Stanford yesterday by Dr. Barghouti, exposes the myth that the wall is being constructed for security purposes. It shows the wall meandering deep inside Palestine, expropriating huge swaths of land and isolating whole villages.

According to the U.N., the partially constructed fence already puts 16% of the West Bank and 13,000 Palestinians on the Israeli side! A startling new fact emerged from Barghouti’s presentation. Israeli is now planning to build an eastern wall to further hem in the Palestinians. Compounding the suffering, is the Israeli checkpoints through which Palestinians must pass. These checkpoints have been strategically located to protect illegal Israeli settlements. Strip searches, denial of health services and myriad of other indignities have been heaped on the civilian population at these checkpoints.  I sincerely hope the International Court will censure Israel and focus more world attention on the sad plight of the Palestinians.

Senator Feinstein re: Aristide of Haiti 3-7-2004

                                                      7,March 2004                               Senator Feinstein re: Aristide of Haiti        

I am profoundly concerned by the proliferation of arms, which has contributed to devastating atrocities around the world. Often these arms flow to countries and armed groups who use them for torture, repression, and crimes against humanity. It is estimated that arms kill approximately 1,300 people daily across the globe - total of half a million per year or almost one life per minute. Sadly, our government is contributing to this human carnage. Its arms exports far exceeds that of other countries. For example, large shipments of M16's and M60's were sent to thugs and criminals in the Dominican Republic who used them, at the behest of the CIA, to overthrow Aristide. It is unconscionable that our tax dollars are being used to destabilize democratically elected governments. Coupled with a trade embargo and $500 million in desperately needed funds withheld by our administration, the fate of Haiti was sealed.

The Democratically elected Republic of the Congo (DRC) is yet another example of US arms sales that have caused misery and devastation on human rights. Over 3 million have died in the DRC since 1998. Abuses include mass killings, the widespread use of torture, the use of landmines, and killings. From 1998 to 2001, the five permanent members of the United States Security Council, the US, UK, France, Russia and China are responsible for a staggering 82% of conventional arms sales. This is an outrage. To exact profits from impoverished nations is a crime against humanity. We are guilty of complicity in the crimes committed by these illicit arms sales. Other countries, most notably Belgium, Israel and Spain have also shipped arms to the DRC.

The US Senate has an obligation to halt the illicit trade. I urge you to table a motion to demand that the Bush Administration takes immediate steps to halt the export of weapons which is contributing to the horror and human suffering in many parts of the world.

Finally, I ask that you ask for an immediate enquiry into circumstances leading to the ouster of Aristide and hold the Bush Administration, accountable for subverting democracy in Haiti and causing death and destruction in a nation already reeling from 100 years of misguided US foreign policy.

President Bush & 911 3-4-2004

                                       4 March, 2004                                     President Bush & 911

I am outraged that the White House junta has launched its Bush 're-election' campaign with a media blitz depicting the raw imagery of Ground Zero. This is blatant exploitation of our national tragedy to advance his political agenda -another example of a broken promise he made to the American people on 1/23/03, that "I will not use the tragedy of 9/11 as a political issue." Family members of the victims of 9/11 are especially upset because of Bush's refusal to testify before the 9/11 commission. The is the beginning of a campaign to perpetuate the myth of a 'popular war time president', who has fortified the resolve of our enemies by his preemptive war on Iraq based on mythical WMD, and 9/11, al Queda connections. Sadly, Bush has declared war on vanishing middle class families, the environment, our civil liberties and even on our children by under -funding the 'no child left behind' by $200 million.

It’s time for a regime change in Washington. Let us send this president back to Texas or perhaps to Alabama to complete his missing one year service in the National Guard.

Early history of Israel 2-25-2004

25, February 2004         Response to Stanford Daily – early history of Israel

I am appalled that the ‘Daily’ should choose to advertise David Horowitz inflammatory diatribe against the suffering of the Palestinians. Hororwitz seems to be inflicted with a convenient bout of amnesia ignoring the circumstances immediately preceding the birth of Israel. The British agreed to an independent Palestinian state in a White Paper published in 1939. Palestine would be an independent state with a Jewish minority limited to 30%. Immigration would be curtailed and purchased of land strictly controlled. The Zionists refused to accept these terms and Haganah, an Israeli terrorist organization, launched a violent campaign to displace Palestinians from their home land. A full day before Britain was to relinquish her power, Israel proclaimed herself a ‘reborn’ nation. By 1948 Jews, a third of the population, owned only 5.6% of the land. However, the UN, under intense pressure from Britain and the US, offered a staggering 56% of Palestine to the proposed Jewish state. Not surprisingly, Palestinians objected. In the ensuing fighting, 780,000 Palestinians fled or were expelled and their homes seized by the Israeli government. By 1953, 370 illegal settlements were formed on land belonging to Palestinian  refugees. Land acquisition for Jewish settlements continues unabated. Sharon’s apartheid wall will expropriate more land, create even greater hardships and confine Palestinians to only 42% of the West Bank! 

The current plight of the Palestinians is best described by Shlomo Avineri, the distinguished Israeli academic, “we remain a neocolonial relationship with the Palestinians, we do things which are incompatible with being a democracy. It coarsens Israeli life, making us all racists. It is utterly demeaning for the Palestinians, who are lined up and searched like cattle every day.”  House demolitions are the order of day. Palestinian civilians are killed with impunity. Even children are not spared. The ghoulish practice of killing children for sport was documented by Chris Hedges of the New York Times.

Israel is now mimicking the savage behavior of the Nazi’s. I urge Horowitz to see the movie ‘Jenin Jenin’ which documents in graphic terms the genocide committed by Israeli forces in April 2002.

Israel’s top ranking soldier, Lt. General Moshe Yaalon, stated that hard lines policies of Sharon works against Israeli interests, increases hatred for Israel and strengthens ‘terror’ organizations. 

Many Israeli reserve pilots presented a signed petition stating they would refuse to take part in “illegal and immoral” strikes in Palestinians areas in the West Bank and Gaza strip. This follows the action of hundreds of reserve soldiers who have pledged not to serve in the West Bank and Gaza strip. One of the petition’s signers was Yiftach Spector, a brigadier general in the reserves.

Israel has violated 68 UN Security Council resolutions and scores of General Assembly resolutions.  They have destroyed hopes for peace, deliberately dismantled the capacity of Palestinian people to govern themselves.

Horowitz parrots the crude propaganda of the Bush Administration in trying to establish a link between Al-Qaeda, 9/11 and the war against the illegal occupation of Iraq and Palestine.

I urge Horowitz to invest his time and money promoting peace and harmony  rather than fermenting hatred.