One-sided facts doom all active in Mideast
debate
Benjamin Nabati’s submission (“Jewish
attachment to Israel is ancient, loving,” Viewpoint,
April 12) claims that the Palestinians have no attachment to their
land and are not a unique nationality, and that Jerusalem is not
even mentioned in the Quran. While Nabati may have valid points in
his arguments, they are completely irrelevant and destructive in
understanding this conflict.
Like most sensitive issues, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is
driven by symbolism as much as fact. It does not matter that
Jerusalem is not mentioned explicitly in the Torah or the
Quran; for believers, Jerusalem is at the core of their religious
being. Similarly, other issues that appear trivial or nonsensical
must be dealt with for their symbolic value. For example,
Palestinians will never take the keys to their former
houses and reclaim ownership, but the symbolism of the keys is
an issue as fundamental as borders. Until supporters of both sides
respect fundamental beliefs as much as objective fact, no
productive dialogue is possible.
Robbie Hurwitz Hebrew University Jerusalem,
Israel
Nabati overlooks historical facts
This letter is in response to a statement by Benjamin Nabati
concerning the Islamic world and the full geographical extent of
this major monotheistic faith (“Jewish
attachment to Israel is ancient, loving,” Viewpoint,
April 12). He fallaciously states that the “Muslim world
stretches from the Maghreb of Northern Africa through
Pakistan.” However, he fails to mention that the
world’s two largest practicing Islamic nations lie outside
this region.
Indonesia in Southeast Asia and India in South Asia are the
world’s largest practicing Islamic nations in the world,
respectively. Even though India is a predominantly Hindu nation
with over 850 million practitioners on the subcontinent alone,
India is home to the second largest concentration of Muslims in the
world with a population of 140 million Islamic practitioners. This
means that there are slightly more Muslims in India than there are
in Pakistan.
Another point I must contest is his assertion that the
Palestinians are indistinguishable from their Arab neighbors and
thus should have no claim to the land of Israel/Palestine. Both
groups have equal claim to the land. Since the Romans destroyed the
Second Temple built by Herod the Great in 70 AD ““ although
there has been a continual Jewish presence in the area ““ the
land has been occupied and settled by various ethnic and religious
groups ranging from Egyptians, Phoenicians, Canaanites,
Philistines, Hellenized Greeks, Romans, Samarians, Byzantine
Greeks, Arabs and British imperialists, among others.
Furthermore, the Jewish scriptures indicate that Abraham, the
patriarch of the Jewish people, and the “sons of the
Covenant” were in fact initially Samarians from the
city-state of Ur in what the ancient Greeks labeled Mesopotamia.
This implies that the ancestors of the Jews were immigrants to the
present landbase in question and are not the
“indigenous” or “original” inhabitants of
the land in question. At no point in history has the “Holy
Land” been thoroughly Jewish in either numerical demographics
or culture. The landbase has been shared by both Jews and non-Jews
alike.
The greatest failure of “democratic” Israel has been
its unwillingness to incorporate the native population of Arabs in
the region. Since 1948, Palestinians were uprooted from their homes
and have been forced to live in exile in refugee camps that are
currently under siege by the Israeli military machine that is
subsidized by U.S. foreign aid and American tax dollars.
After three generations of humiliation, the Palestinians are
justifiably upset and vocal about their demands for
self-determination. If Israel wants to stand on high moral ground,
it should allow the “Right of Return” to 3.6 million
third-generation Palestinian refugees. Sadly though,
“democratic” Israel is currently unwilling to do so. A
true democracy in Israel would embrace the multi-ethnic,
multi-linguistic, and multi-religious population that occupies the
disputed land.
Gustavo Gutierrez Fourth-year History and
sociology
Ali must look at whole story
I find Mujtaba Ali’s column to be disturbing in his use of
half-truths to vilify the American military (“Military
massacres kept from public,” Viewpoint, April 11). An
example of this was the description
given of the Uruzgan raid. Ali laments the deaths of 16
“young Afghan men,” calling them “civilian
casualties,” and completely ignores the fact that one Special
Forces soldier was shot by the “young civilians” during
the raid. They were armed, and they were hostile. Would Ali suggest
that Special Forces soldiers do not return fire because the Afghans
shooting them aren’t Taliban or al-Qaeda? He also states as
fact that two Afghans were killed while bound, a story reported
later by Afghan militiamen, who are hardly reliable witnesses.
My suggestion for Ali is, if he is going to accuse men and women
of conducting “massacres,” he should at least have the
decency to research all the relevant facts first.
Frank Nilsen Second-year History