December 12, 2017: More readers weigh in on US recognition of Jerusalem

DECEMBER 11, 2017 22:26

Letters (photo credit: REUTERS) — Letters

(photo credit: REUTERS)

In response to President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, Muslims around the world rioted, Hamas declared war and the liberal media had a conniption. So what else is new?

Those who warn that this move will lead to violence willfully ignore the fact that we live in a world where cartoons and YouTube videos lead to violence. Should America’s foreign policy be dictated by a fear of triggering the micro-aggressions of hypersensitive zealots?

Any casualties resulting from this innocuous admission of reality are not the fault of Israel or President Trump; the blame lies with governments, regimes, religious leaders and media outlets that scapegoat Israel as the one and only obstacle to regional peace.

Everyone threatening Israel since this announcement has been threatening Israel since its inception. Many of them don’t even include Israel on their maps, and America’s refusal to recognize Israel’s capital would be no less ridiculous.

This is long overdue.

GARY TAUSTINE
New York

I was in Israel in 1957, when east Jerusalem was off-limits. Consequently, I was unable to get to the sacred Western Wall. I returned to Israel in 1969, when east Jerusalem was already in Israel’s hands and the Old City was open to all.

If it is declared – and it should be – that although it will remain Israel’s capital, the city will always be open to people of all religions who wish to visit, tempers around the world might die down and the UN would have less to complain about.

SUE SUSSMAN
London

I would like to point out that Jerusalem is mentioned 811 times in both the Bible and the New Testament. It is not mentioned once in the Koran.

How many times did an Arab leader other than the late King Hussein of Jordan come to the city of Jerusalem to visit the Dome of the Rock or the Aksa Mosque, Islam’s third holiest site, when it was under Jordanian rule from 1948 until 1967? Not once.

HELA TAMIR
Neve Ilan

The writer is a licensed Israeli tour guide.

History records that on December 11, 1917, British Gen. Edmund Allenby dismounted from his horse and entered into the Old City of Jerusalem on foot by way of the Jaffa Gate. Allenby refused to ride into Jerusalem out of respect for the religious sanctity of the Holy City and also in deference to his beliefs as an evangelical Christian that only the messiah should ride in one day.

US President Donald Trump has now issued a major statement officially solidifying America’s long-held views about the special relationship between Israel and Jerusalem. Trump, long known for his pro-Israel views, was also pressed to take this bold step by his main political allies, millions of conservative Bible believers.

David, a great Jewish king, famously described his ancient capital as “the city of the great kings.” The world’s three monotheistic religions, which all value Jerusalem, differ over the identity of the future “great king,” but multitudes of adherents from all three faiths are convinced that he’s surely coming, and that he’s coming to Jerusalem!

May God hasten the arrival of this promised figure, for Jerusalem can hardly bear another 100 years of waiting!

DAVID N. DECKER
Jerusalem

The writer is a Baptist pastor.

President Trump’s magnificent, heart-filled declaration should be welcomed by all free men in the spirit in which it was expressed. Once and for all, this has nailed the coffin of the corpus separatum concept to oblivion.

It is unfortunate that major western powers such as the UK have decided not to follow the example of the US. Theresa May, whose father was a Church of England clergyman, was obviously exposed to the Bible during her formative years. The Bible unequivocally refers to Jerusalem as being the Jewish capital city. Furthermore, she is closely associated with the Anglo Jewish establishment, so why did she fail to follow through? Was it pandering to the UK’s rapidly growing Muslim community or the historic anti-Israel stance of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office mandarins?

The UK maintained consular offices in Jerusalem on the grounds St. Andrews Church adjacent to the Begin Center, but closed them down on the grounds that the buildings were required by the church. However, in the intervening 14 years, the buildings have remained dormant.

Just prior to the Six Day War, the UK purchased a swath of land in Jerusalem within 60 meters of the 1949 armistice line. It remains undeveloped. Was it purchased for a new embassy to an Arab or Palestinian state since the UK, in the days leading up to the war, expected Israel to be destroyed?

COLIN L. LECI
Jerusalem

How about we take the land illegally occupied by the UN overlooking all of Jerusalem from the south, and gift it to the people of the United States for an embassy? It’s a beautiful, easily secured vista that would befit the Rome of the 21st century.

What say you?

MICHAEL T. COHEN
Aderet

The many fine opinion pieces and editorials that have appeared since President Trump’s statement on Jerusalem need no embellishment. I would, however, like to add an extra dimension to the response – the British-Israel one.

It is 100 years since Jerusalem surrendered to the British and centuries of benighted Muslim corruption, neglect and exploitation came to an end. It should have been the start of a century of Jewish and enlightened western partnership. Instead, almost immediately, the creeping backsliding began, with the British general, Edmund Allenby himself, entering the city on foot to minimize Muslim sensibilities.

The history of the British Mandate itself is well known, with British treachery and betrayal always paralleling the positive elements of British rule, of which there were also many examples. This two-faced approach, championed by an unreconstructed public-school, salon-antisemitic and Arabist Foreign Office, continues to this day – always trying to have it both ways.

The British head of state has never visited here officially. And now, British Prime Minister Theresa May and Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson – the latter ostensibly a “friend of Israel” – condemn the act of historic and natural justice belatedly wrought by the US president, with the usual appeasement mentality and mealy-mouthed “concerns” about the “peace process” and negotiated settlements.

It is a source of continuing shame to me, a Briton by birth, the betrayal of Britain’s nobler instincts that led it to fight against evil so many times. Couldn’t the establishment for once just do the right thing?

ANTHONY LUDER
Rosh Pina

I remember the anxiety generated when US president Harry S. Truman recognized the State of Israel in 1948. There was a great deal of hand-wringing as people agonized as to what the results of his action would be. As it turned out, it was the beginning of the greatest epic in the growth of modern Israel.

President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel is evoking similar responses. There is no doubt in my mind that the results will be equally positive.

I am not a Kabbalist, but the reality of the first letters in the names of both men – t-r-u – strikes me as not being an accident.

NORBERT WEINBERG
Efrat/Newport, Massachusetts

The writer is a rabbi.