When the Arabs living in Palestine rejected the UN partition plan and attacked the nascent Israeli state with evil intent, they became fully responsible for all the consequences.
By LETTERS TO THE EDITORLetters(photo credit: REUTERS)Let Danon pick his people Regarding “Prosecution orders initial probe of Danny Danon” (December 5), every public official wants to work with people he knows because he trusts those who are loyal. Who would want to hire people who will work against him?The party primary system is an improvement over the ways of the past. Let Danon pick his people. He is doing a fine job for Israel as ambassador to the United Nations and apparently knows how to get things done effectively.TOBY WILLIG JerusalemColossal rubbish advice In response to “Rabbi bans banknote featuring poet who married non-Jew” (December 5) and the injunction by a senior Haredi rabbi that it is forbidden to speak to Christians, how would Rabbi Ben Zion Motzpi realistically expect the government of Israel to pull that off given negotiations with non-Jews?Does he realize how this would impact Christian tourism? He’d put thousands of tour guides out of business, not to mention hotels, restaurants, tourist shops and the like.This has to be the most colossal piece of rubbish advice that has ever been offered. I can’t think of a better way to hurt our economy and foment anti-Jewish and anti-Israeli sentiment than this.Someone needs to seriously remind this rabbi that we are a minority in a world of non-Jews, many of whom love us, pray for us and support us in word and deed. To alienate them is insanity, but so is this idea!COOKIE SCHWAEBER-ISSAN GizoJust another ployWith regard to “Opposition pans approval of grocery-store bill as ‘religious coercion’” (December 5), so now it’s called “religious coercion.” What do we have if Shabbat is taken away? We have a people like any other – and we aren’t like any other.We gave the world the day of rest. This concept was given us at Mount Sinai when we received the Torah.Next week it will be Hanukka, and everyone, religious or not, lights Hanukka candles. What we are celebrating is the fact that we beat the ancient Greeks. What did they want? To take away our Shabbat.But the bottom line is why wait for Shabbat to go shopping? Aren’t six days of the week enough? It’s just another ploy to turn this country into the world that so many of us left behind in coming here.JUDY FORDPetah TikvaAccording to the Ynet news website, when the government decided to allow enforcement of the closure of supermarkets on Shabbat, it prompted Defense Minister and Israel Beytenu party leader Avigdor Liberman to cry that Theodor Herzl had not been religious. I loved Education Minister and Bayit Yehudi leader Naftali Bennett’s response: “Without 3,000 years of Shabbat, there would be no Herzl.”I wish, however, to make it clear that I believe Herzl to have been a true Jewish hero. Despite the fact that he was not an observant Jew, he burned himself out for the Jewish people, his beloved people, and died at a very early age. This is known as mesirut nefesh (giving one’s all, even to the point of self-sacrifice), and that is the stuff of which true religiousness is made.DAVID HEIMOWITZ Kfar SabaNo ‘historical injustice’ I write in response to Gershon Baskin’s “November 29 – a national Holiday” (Encountering Peace, November 30), taking serious issue with his premise, in reference to the United Nations’ partition plan of November 29, 1947, that it is now up to Israel to make compromises in order to “complete the fulfillment of the resolution and partition the land into two states for two people.”Baskin writes: “Yes, it is true the Palestinians rejected the partition plan and paid a very painful price for their rejection.” But there is no mention of the enormous price Israel paid – the loss of 6,000 soldiers and civilians, killed in an existential war initiated by the Palestinian Arabs and their Arab allies, intent on driving all Jews out of the area. There would have been no need for Israel to fight its War of Independence but for their aggression and intransigence.When the Arabs living in Palestine rejected the UN partition plan and attacked the nascent Israeli state with evil intent, they became fully responsible for all the consequences of their aggressive actions.There was no “historical injustice done to the Palestinian Arab people in its displacement and in being deprived of the right to self-determination following the adoption of General Assembly resolution 181 (II) of 1947, which partitioned Palestine into an Arab and a Jewish State,” contrary to the claims made in the PLO’s 1988 independence declaration. The truth is exactly the opposite: The Palestinians were offered land on which to establish an independent state where they could live with full rights of self-determination, just as Israelis have for the past 70 years.The only injustice was carried out by those who chose to viciously attack the Jews in an attempt to deprive them of their rights under the same partition plan.Since 1947, the “Palestinians” have at least three times rejected offers of land for a state. Written into the Covenant of the PLO in 1964 was Article 19, which stated: “The partitioning of Palestine and the establishment of Israel is fundamentally null and void, whatever time has elapsed.”Only someone who is completely ignorant or one who refuses to acknowledge the facts could possibly believe that it is now the duty of Israel to once again partition the land so that, as Baskin states, “a holiday... could be shared by both people living between the River and the Sea....”BARBARA BROWN NetanyaThanking Princeton ChabadRegarding the November 9 letters to the editor condemning the Princeton University Hillel for canceling the lecture by Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely (“Hotovely at Princeton”), I would like to thank the Chabad Student Center at Princeton for coming to the rescue in hosting Ms. Hotovely.In Pirkei Avot (Ethics of Our Fathers) 2:6, the great sage Hillel advised: “In a place where there are no leaders, strive to be that leader.” Chabad has consistently been the leader in bringing Jews together rather than creating and exacerbating division between Jews.It seems to me that the non-Orthodox community has enveloped itself in a liberal-progressive mold and has substituted its Judaism for a leftist ideology. This has resulted in giving aid, comfort and cover to those whose desire is to harm Israel and Jews everywhere.A wake-up call is desperately needed.MOSHE STERN Beit ShemeshThe writer is a rabbi.Credit where due People tend to complain about the poor service we get from the Israel Postal Company, but I feel the need to give credit where credit is due.Last June, I made a short visit to Zambia, and while there I sent a few postcards to friends and family back home. As these postcards seemed not to have arrived, I was sure they had gotten lost on the way.But miracle of miracles! Just last week, three postcards arrived at their destinations. They were postmarked June 30 in Zambia. Can you imagine that for less than $1, someone hand-delivered my postcards from Zambia to Israel and it only took five months! Amazing!BENJIE AZIZ Efrat
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