Ban should immediately leave the world stage to others who are infinitely more capable.
By LETTERS TO THE EDITORLetters(photo credit: REUTERS)Ban’s words In an idiotic diatribe, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has managed to justify the terrorism that kills and maims Israeli citizens each and every day (“PM blasts Ban: ‘Your remarks fuel Palestinian terrorism,’” January 27).There can be no justification for any killing. Terrorism is terrorism and murder is murder, and it is ludicrous and sinful for the UN secretary- general to even remotely suggest otherwise. It should also be noted that every Palestinian who has needlessly lost his or her life in the current wave of violence has done so in perpetrating of an act of violence against Israelis.I also reject the argument that these are lone-wolf episodes – young Palestinian men and women are being incited by their leaders (and now by Ban) to kill.The secretary-general should be ashamed. His words are hateful, harmful and wrong, and will further inflame and incite Palestinian youth to kill. He heads what was once, so long ago, a respected, august institution. Now it is just a craven forum for reprehensible anti-Israel, anti-democratic rhetoric.Ban should immediately leave the world stage to others who are infinitely more capable.ARNOLD EPSTEINJerusalemThe absolute stupidity of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon knows no bounds. Indeed, truth is stranger than fiction.I await his declaration that it was only human nature for the perpetrators of 9/11 to horribly murder thousands of innocents, since the attackers were reacting to American colonialism and a decadent Western culture.STUART PILICHOWSKIMevaseretZion Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is angry at UN Secretary- General Ban Ki-moon, who said: “It is human nature to react to occupation, which often serves as a potent incubator of hate and extremism.... Palestinian frustration is growing under the weight of a half century of occupation and the paralysis of the peace process.”What angers me is that Netanyahu continues to beg Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to return to negotiations regarding the surrender of more of our land to terrorists.A Palestinian people born from the imagination of the Arab League as a political ploy to destroy Israel must be called what it is – a lie of humongous proportions. We need to see and hear our own growing frustration under the weight of the occupation of our land by the Arabs, and from the inability or unwillingness of the government to stop the daily murders of our people.We must stand up as a proud people and demand the total destruction of our enemies.Instead of digging Jewish graves, we should be digging to build Jewish homes.PHYLLIS STERN Netanya Each time I hear that the Palestinian violence is caused by the lack of a two-state solution, the settlements and the occupation, I wonder why the world can’t understand that the Palestinians just don’t want us here.They talk about it openly. In their schools, children learn that Israel will all be Palestine. They have had many opportunities to make peace, but they don’t want it. Life is cheap for them and they get paid very well when they sit in prison.The world should get wise and learn its history. Then, maybe it will know what’s really going on.JUDY FORDPetah TikvaThere is nothing Israel can do to prevent terrorism. Terrorism has its own agenda. Israelis are not provoking it by either their actions or their non-actions.Islamic terrorism is opportunistic.Its goal is the destruction of Western societies and their replacement with a caliphate.Radical Islam has the Koran, the mosque and the media to propel it. It doesn’t need us.Today, as we see the invasion of Europe and the lap-dog eagerness of Western companies and governments to do business with Iran, one has to wonder why terrorism is required at all, unless it’s just one more element to speed the fall of the Judeo-Christian world.LEN BENNETTOttawaEmpty condemnations I agree with the sentiments expressed by Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely (“PA using foreign aid to fund terror, Hotovely says,” January 26), who complained that the Palestinians are using aid from the Europeans and others to pay jailed terrorists and their families.I have forwarded to American Jewish groups an on-line petition with many signatories complaining that we are horribly silent as the Obama administration continues to send the Palestinian Authority hundreds of millions of dollars annually. The administration treats the PA as an actual peace partner when it is known to incite Palestinians through the media and name streets after terrorists, whose blood PA President Mahmoud Abbas calls “holy.”Why are our organizations not demanding repercussions instead of empty condemnations?BEN KLEINNew YorkMaps are key Daniel Schatz’s “Sweden and Israel: A complex relationship” (Comment & Features, January 26) states: “Israel, the previously embattled David, [is presently] viewed as the new Goliath and the main obstacle toward a resolution of the conflict.”To counter this false demonization, Israel should distribute tens of millions of maps throughout the world showing tiny Israel surrounded by hostile Arab and Muslim countries, including Iran and Pakistan. Mention, too, that present- day Jordan was initially to be part of Israel.The maps should also show how Israel made two very generous attempts at peace in 2000 (under the Barak administration) and 2008 (under the Olmert administration) by offering large areas of land, but that the Arabs wanted more territory, and also wanted to flood Israel with millions of refugees, most of them not even born when Israel was established.Nothing will satisfy the Arabs and their anti-Semitic backers except the destruction of Israel – and now the Arabs are moving into fertile Europe. Soon they will claim these lands, too, as their own.NISSIM BAHARAshdodWrong book Regarding “Family of Eritrean infant attacked in Tel Aviv two years ago gets refugee status in Europe” (January 24), how sad that Israel did not see fit to grant the infant and her family residency, or at least pay for her medical treatment.We are supposed to be the people of the book. Lately, it seems that we are reading the wrong book.SALLY ROSSNetanyaAcross the board In “How to save Conservative Judaism” (Middle Israel, January 22), Amotz Asa-El falls into the trap of what ails all of Judaism – the Reform, Conservative and modern Orthodox movements, and what he calls “Israel’s monolithic Orthodoxy.” Across the board, all have either shunned, forgotten or simply do not realize that Torah is meant to be the basis for, and the expression of, a relationship with God.Consider any kind of relationship – spousal, parental, sibling, friendship. To keep such relationships, we have to work at them, and it is not easy. We are not always comfortable with what the relationship demands of us, but we do it because we value the relationship and see the value in it.Education is Asa-El’s starting point, but what is the content of that education? Reducing and defining adherence to Jewish law and ethics to physical ritual is to turn Judaism into a religion – actions devoid of context, thought or purpose.The idea should be to bring Jews – all Jews – back to who we are, which means understanding the relationship between God and His people.This should be the focus.This should be the priority.Across the board.BOB YERMUSJerusalem
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