March 23: Attacks in Brussels

By LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Letters (photo credit: REUTERS)
Letters
(photo credit: REUTERS)
Attacks in Brussels
With regard to “At least 30 dead in Brussels terrorist bombings” (March 23), the Brussels Airport explosion was near the American Airlines desk despite the fact that the airline had recently canceled its flights to Israel to placate the Arabs. The explosion in the Brussels metro was near the European Union offices despite the billions the EU donates annually to the Arabs.
Tuesday’s violence once again demonstrates that Arabs equate appeasement with weakness. It encourages more violence.
CHARLES OREN Herzliya
With the greatest interest and sympathy, I read “More security cooperation, but not more support” (Analysis, March 23) by Herb Keinon. Unfortunately, he is completely right when asserting that we cannot expect that Tuesday’s terrorist atrocities in Brussels will in any significant way alter how either Belgium or the European Union view Israel.
The reasons for the one-sided and biased views of Israel cover a spectrum, ranging from sheer ignorance about Israel and its history to simply swimming with the mainstream, and even to outright anti-Semitism. The latter, of course, is now increasing on account of the high influx of people into Europe, especially Germany, who have been taught anti-Semitism from early infancy and who, due to their illiteracy, easily fall prey.
The emerging alliance between Muslim anti-Semitism and leftwing anti-Zionism (which can even be found in the European Parliament) is intimidating.
MARTIN ARNDT Zagreb
Now that the forces of Mohammedan terrorism have waged attacks on European soil, namely France and Belgium, the victims and the “international community” alike are voicing a shattering tirade against the attackers. Where were they in the days of Arab terrorist attacks against Israel? The United Nations was largely mute. The western powers, dreading another Arab oil boycott, refrained from expressing any real sympathy with Israel. Now the machinations of Muslim terrorism have rebounded on them, causing them to howl in hellish distress.
The sad truth is that had the world forcefully united to condemn Arab and Mohammedan terrorism when the so-called Palestine Liberation Organization was founded at the end of 1964, the warriors of Satan would have been greatly discouraged from staging their operations abroad.
There is still time for the world to repent and stem the crimson tide by showing the Mohammedans that it will have absolutely no tolerance for further terrorist attacks, whether in Israel or Europe or farther afield. A pack of wild beasts can be defeated only by force.
ROY RUNDS Tel Aviv
Mr. Obama in Cuba
With regard to “Obama meets with Castro in heart of Havana” (March 22), US President Barack Obama has proved once again that his contribution to world peace is, and has been, non-existent.
While Brussels was struggling to cope with the aftermath of two horrific bombings, he was delivering a speech in Cuba calling for “the world to unite to defeat terrorism.”
Rather than concentrate on such a goal, he considers his time wellspent courting the Cuban people.
To misquote Oscar Wilde, to vote Obama into power once may be regarded as a misfortune, but to do it twice looks like lunacy.
DAVID S. ADDLEMAN Mevaseret Zion
How sad and ironic that Barack Obama is willing to embrace and recognize the totalitarian regime of Castro’s Cuba while he ignores Jerusalem, the eternal capital of the Jewish people.
MATTIAS ROTENBERG Petah Tikva
The mikve issue
With regard to “A-G: Knesset bill restricting mikve use is unconstitutional” (March 21), the Reform movement long ago discarded “gender-discriminatory practices” such as the mikve, but even so, I very much doubt if any lady adherent has ever, or ever would be, denied access if she turned up to use it.
What the new bill is designed to do is prevent mikvaot from being used for non-Orthodox conversion procedures. Since Reform Judaism has abolished this requirement, its insistence on exercising it is no more than a deliberate provocation of Orthodox religious sensibilities.
Would Attorney-General Avichai Mandelblit uphold similar claims from Jews for Jesus for their own “conversions,” and if not, on what grounds would he disallow it? While we might agree that they are not a bona fide Jewish denomination, they would disagree, and it is difficult to design criteria whereby they are excluded while Reform Jews are not.
Surely, the real solution is for the state to build a mikve for all the non-Orthodox groups, though, in all probability, its usage would hardly justify the expense. That would expose their hypocrisy for all to see.
MARTIN D. STERN Salford, UK
I believe it is time for people to join one of the country’s non-Orthodox or liberal-Orthodox movements.
Imagine if these movements, which are busy trying to give everyone a chance to be religious, had some muscle.
There are many Orthodox, Conservative and Reform congregations that need our membership so that they can speak for the people in the broadest sense of the word.
MURRAY S. GREENFIELD Tel Aviv
US elections
As longtime readers of The Jerusalem Post, we have always admired your journalistic objectivity.
However, we recently have been bombarded by “cartoons” casting aspersions on Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.
This is a one-sided approach to American politics, which does not suit your fine newspaper. How about a caricature of Hillary Clinton walking on water?
DAVID and PHYLLIS RATNER Haifa US
President Barack Obama, when he reached his nuclear accord with Iran, made the worst deal in history. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was invited by Congress to talk sense to the American people in hopes of stopping it.
Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, speaking on a US news channel, recently described Netanyahu as “a guy who kind of crashed the United States Congress to give his speech there, ignoring President Obama, not even consulting with him, using it for political purposes back home, a guy who has supported the growth of settlements.”
If I, my family and my country were under existential threat, you’re damn right I’d do anything in my power to prevent it. Netanyahu’s speech before Congress had nothing to do with politics.
Sanders states that since he was once on a kibbutz, he knows something about Israel. Nonsense.
He knows a lot more about communism than he does about Israel.
I’m in no way calling him a self-hating Jew, but I believe that given the opportunity, he could become one. What is certain is that he is no friend of Israel.
LEON KUSHNER Toronto
Purim’s upon us...
Ah! The wonderful holiday of Purim is here once again. Like Hanukka, it’s when we celebrate: They tried to kill us, we won, let’s eat.
Have a safe and sane Purim!
NORMAN DEROVAN Ma’aleh Adumim
...and then Passover!
After Purim, we begin cleaning and preparing for Pessah. We are careful to read the labels on the products we buy to make sure they bear the words “Kosher for Passover.”
My St. Moritz toilet bowl cleanser has the admonitions “Keep away from eyes, skin, nose and mouth” and “Warning! Do not eat!” Yet, at the lower left-hand corner of the label, there is a seal from the Badatz of the Eda Haredit of Jerusalem saying “Kosher for Passover.”
The author Philip Roth wrote that you could eat off Mrs. Portnoy’s bathroom floor. But eating from the toilet bowl, and on Pessah?
IDA SELAVAN SCHWARCZ Ganei Omer