Letters to the Editor: April 22, 2016

It’s heartwarming reading about someone from the “old country” becoming successful here in Israel.

By LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Updated: APRIL 21, 2016 22:19
Letters (photo credit: REUTERS)
Letters
(photo credit: REUTERS)
Good luck
I would like to add my name to the list (“Chi-Town Success,” Letters, April 19) of former Chicagoans that are proud of Yaakov Katz’s appointment as editor-in-chief of The Jerusalem Post.
It’s heartwarming reading about someone from the “old country” becoming successful here in Israel.
It’s also wonderful to know that I’m not the only one who thought about it.
SUSAN COOPERSMITH
Ma’aleh Adumim
On the money
I want to applaud Mohamed Chtatou for his outstanding essay about the Arab Spring (“Is the Arab dream of democracy truly broken,” Comment and Features, April 20).
His analysis about the fate and fortune of the Arab rejection of authoritarianism was on the money.
And his warning about the future, which this liberation movement portends to those who imagine that authoritarianism in our region will yet win the day, ought to be heeded by our decision makers in Jerusalem.
This warning is especially relevant to those in our country who embrace President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s Egypt with uncritical and unrestrained gusto.
And it is even more poignant for those who imagine that Israel can help secure its future by pursuing the fantasy of a semipublic- semi-secret “alliance” with the decrepit House of Ibn Saud.
My only reservations about Mr. Chtatou’s analysis are his failure to link the Arab Spring to the death of bi-polarity and his reluctance to state in a more forthright manner that the Arab Spring is also the death knell of Islam.
But within the context of his essay, these reservations are but a quibble.
AVI BERKOWITZ
Efrat
Move Right
There is a definite double standard pervading the Israeli-Arab/Palestinian view of justice! If I as an Israeli, do not pay my electric bill, I have my service cut.
Not so when it comes to Palestinians, (“High Court interim order: No cutting off West Bank, east Jerusalem electricity due to debt,” April 21) who swear by all that is holy to destroy us.
Internationally, you cannot cut water. Why has the so called state of “Palestine” not financed its own electric infrastructure, instead of developing and backing terrorism, besides lining the pockets of their leaders? In another article in the same issue, opposition leader Isaac Herzog is criticized for using a possible racist word (“Herzog slammed for remarks about ‘Arab lovers’”) while Joint List MK Haneen Zoabi, on the same page, vilifies Israel and uses racist terms (“Zoabi: Similarities between Israel today and 1930s Germany”). This woman even took part in the Mavi Marmara incident, and wasn’t jailed for treason! And now, while the young Hebron soldier is heavily criticized, terrorists/ murderers in our jails are well fed and studying for university degrees at our pleasure.
When will the Left learn what is justice and truth?
S. GELGOR
Tel Aviv