Readers' corner
Desire to kill
Sir-- The Gaza Freedom Flotilla was simply the latest of many similar efforts to break the blockade of Gaza. Some involve overland convoys, some use the sea; none are "terrorist" missions as so many Israeli agencies falsely suggest.
Genuine cowards those Israeli commandos -- so inept that they are in reality and will always be, a superb joke; an absolute laughing stock for all military in the world. So are the defenders of the Israeli terrorists who killed the peaceful members of that crew. Israel knew that the peace activists were no threat; that is why no Israeli soldiers were killed.
Israeli laws mirror South Africa's apartheid laws and they are strictly enforced in the Jewish state. They have built terrible huge walls across the West Bank and they planted them squarely across the farm fields. Today Israeli troops shoot and kill farmers with sniper rifles which is documented and happens frequently.
Israel is an unjust nation, with apartheid laws which should immediately be banished. Israeli supporters equate criticism of their deadly attacks on Palestinians as "anti-Semitic" and that is the most ridiculous lame assertion in the world. The agreed upon bottom line message is that oppressive politics and their sponsor governments are not acceptable in today's world, nor should they ever have been.
The Palestinians have been suffering massive discrimination for over 60 years. The UN is shrugged aside by Israel and the US. It is a real embrace of evil and the unwavering endorsement of military high-handedness.
The Israeli public relations campaign to spin unarmed defenders into scary "dangerous" people with "sticks" and "metal rods" as if these were real weapons, is equally laughable. The people on the flotilla carried a desire to help people live. The Israelis carried a desire to kill.
People who are pushed to the very edge of existence can be an unstable lot, that is true.
But people in awfully clean and well pressed uniforms are also capable of doing terrible things.
Today the shoe is on a different foot and it is time for Israel to raise the bar instead of lowering the boom on Arab people.
Tom King
Oregon
USA
Instead of Israel
Sir-- Netanyahu, obsessed as he is with Iran, must have nightmares about missiles raining down on his head from the north (Lebanon) and the west (Gaza). Yet any sane and knowledgeable observer can tell the prime minister there are at least two viable ways of preventing this eventuality short of starving the people of Gaza. One is long term and the other short term. The long-term solution is simply to make peace by returning to the 1967 border. Hamas has recently announced that they are willing to live peacefully alongside Israel if it gives up its expansionist and colonist policies. And, personally, I find the word of Hamas's leadership more believable than that of men in Jerusalem.
Every objective observer knows that going back to the green line is a sine qua non for peace, even the decreasing number of sane Israelis still living in the country.
In the short-term the Israelis can simply do what the British did throughout a history of naval blockades (the British virtually invented the tactic). That is, you stop and inspect incoming vessels (avoiding the tactics we witnessed last month). If they are carrying what you consider missiles, or parts thereof, you confiscate them. If they are carrying all the sorts of things that the Gaza Flotilla was carrying, you let them through. It takes a bit of work, but it can be done that way. Of course, this should preferably be carried out by a neutral UN force because the Israelis have proven themselves incapable of handling such a job in a civilised manner.
Lawrence Davidson
Pennsylvania
USA
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