Letters: October 17, 2014

"Here in the Middle East, the war is already in full swing. Israel is on the front lines, with Hamas and Hezbollah on its borders."

By LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Letters (photo credit: REUTERS)
Letters
(photo credit: REUTERS)
Hopes he’s mistaken
Sir, – I am almost 94 years old and hope that I am mistaken, but with regard to “Hot off the Arab press” (October 3), it seems we are engaged in a defensive war against Islam – a war that cannot be won. US President Barack Obama and Western leaders send dollars and planes to wipe out Islamic State, but they cannot eliminate the cancer itself, which already exists everywhere in the world.
Every country in Europe has a minority of Muslims; most have millions. A friend of mine in Germany tells me on the phone: “Don’t you worry, we will cope. Most of them are peace-loving citizens.”
Most of them? Let’s say 95 percent, which means there are 5%, or 200,000, who are not so peace-loving. If only 5% of these are extremists, my friend has to cope with 10,000 Muslims who are prepared to blow themselves up if enough infidels are martyred along with them.
Even if I exaggerate, their aim is not only to kill, but to convert the world. Those who don’t convert will be shortened by a head, as we have seen on the news. The Islamists see the West’s rules of the game, like democracy and tolerance, as weaknesses – and use them to their own advantage.
Here in the Middle East, the war is already in full swing. Israel is on the front lines, with Hamas and Hezbollah on its borders. I live just 8 km. from the Lebanese border, and would not be surprised if missiles were to start raining down on me in the next five minutes.
ANDREAS MEYER
Kfar Vradim
Self-identification
Sir, – On November 3, 2014, the US Supreme Court will hear arguments in a very unusual case of great consequence to Jews there and around the world. Yet this case – Zivotofsky vs Kerry – has not been given the attention it deserves by the mainstream media.
The case is about the State Department’s policy of refusing to indicate Israel as the country of birth on the US passports of Jews born in Jerusalem. Instead, in compliance with internal manuals, the State Department merely writes the city of birth without identifying the country.
The parents of Menachem Zivotofsky have sued the State Department to require it to list Israel on their child’s passport.
Menachem was born in Jerusalem in 2002; both of his parents are US citizens.
In 2002, Congress passed the Foreign Relations Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2003, which specifically allowed US citizens born in Jerusalem to have Israel listed as the country of birth on their US passport.
Lawyers for Secretary of State John Kerry now argue that this provision of the law is unconstitutional since it should be the president and the State Department that determine whether the US recognizes the sovereignty of a country.
Notably, American citizens born in Taiwan are allowed to list it as their birthplace, despite the fact that the US does not recognize the independence of Taiwan from China.
In its brief urging of the Supreme Court to uphold State Department policy, the US government asserts that if the US were to recognize Israel’s sovereignty over Jerusalem, the peace process would be undermined.
The International Association of Jewish Lawyers and Jurists weighed in on the matter with a friend-of-the-court brief. It noted that granting a passport indicating birth in Jerusalem, Israel, would not be a statement of recognition; instead, it would merely be a statement of the bearer’s self-identification.
The case has moved through the legal system almost from the beginning of Menachem Zivotofsky’s life, about 12 years ago. It is way past time for the US to recognize the right of Jews born in Jerusalem to determine their own identity.
ILYA ABLAVSKY
Lynn, Massachusetts
CLARIFICATION
As noted in the first paragraph of ‘Israel’s modern foremothers,’ the murderers of Naftali Fraenkel, Gil-Ad Shaer and Eyal Yifrah were killed by the IDF. The Post regrets the confusion that might have been caused by the wording and layout of the paragraph.