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Middle East Crisis: Your Thoughts
The primary issue in the Middle East conflict, as I understand it, has to do
with the suicide bombings and the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian
homeland. But there are other issues as well: the use of the Israeli
military with their Apache helicopter gunships and their tanks against an
essentially unarmed civilian population; the destruction of Palestinian
homes and other property on the assumption that those buildings harbour
terrorists; the attempted destruction of the bases of the Palestinian
terrorist organization in the hope that their destruction will stop the
suicide bombings and other terrorists' attacks.
The suicide bombings have nothing to do with Israeli's military response;
the suicide bombings have everything to do with the fact that the
Palestinians regard themselves as people who have been dispossessed of their
homeland; that they are essentially powerless against an overwhelming
military force; that they are barred from arming themselves with comparable
weaponry; that they feel great shame that they have been forced out of their
homeland where their families have lived for generation after generation.
Faced with the loss of their homeland, an overpowering military force and
their own feelings of powerlessness and shame, the Palestinians have had to
devise strategies to protest the injustices of their situation. Hence the
intefada.
The Israelis will never bring peace to the region by punishing the
Palestinians with such violent retribution as they are presently inflicting
upon them. They must withdraw their army from the occupied territories;
they must vacate their over 140 illegal settlements from Gaza and the West
Bank housing over 200,000 Israeli citizens; they must withdraw from their
control over the Golan Heights and East Jeruselam; they must be content to
exist within their own borders as established by the United Nations in 1947,
and give the Palestinians their right to exist within theirs.
Dear to the heart of the Palestinians is the right of return to the towns
and villages from which they were driven. This is now impossible because
many of the towns and villages no longer exist. The Palestinians must be
content to live within the borders of what is left of their homeland as
their contribution to peace, however difficult that would be for them.
Israel must do the same.
Barry V. Fisher
Calgary, Alberta
I am neither a jew nor arab but one who is repulsed by the killings in the
Middle East.
I believed Israel has gone too far this time by incursing into Palestinian
territories with such impunity, neither lives nor property has escaped the
real motives of Sharon's "mad" pursuit of terrorists.
One inescapable reality was the blatant distructions of Palestinian property
which lead me to believe that Sharon's "excuse" for the pursuit of
terrorists was merely a pretext to actually FLATTEN out Palestinian
settlements so that it would become too costly for them to continue
habitation on the much coveted properties for Israeli settlers coming from
various parts of the world!
Ferdinand Sumcad
Canada, the US and everybody else should stay out of the mid-east crisis. I constantly see people taking sides in the issue and the thing is, neither side is right as long as they use violence to enforce their views. International involvement will only create a split in the issue which can only lead to a devastating, possibly global war between Muslims countries and those supporting Israel. If Canada takes sides it may involve itself in a much larger conflict the world doesn’t need. Walk away and let natural selection take its course. Let’s worry about protecting Canada and its citizens. Rather than allow us to get involved in petty issues of other nations.
Tom Wilson
Toronto, Ontario
I don't blame Israel for going after terrorists by force. Isn't that what the U.S. is doing?
Israel has had it's 9/11s ... and 10/11 .. and 11/11 ... and 12/11 ... for decades now. They have put up with a degree of terrorism that the U.S. would never tolerate.
Israel has obviously decided that diplomacy and cease-fires and peace agreements aren't going to stop it's citizens from being murdered by Palestinian terrorists. It's been tried for decades. Now is the time for Israel to "go after" the terrorists a la Alfganistan, and physically capture persons and weapons obviously meant for killing Israelis. I am fully behind Israel's invasion. They don't intend to take over Palestine, although there are extremist Jews who would prefer that. Israel just wants to be left alone. But the Arabs will never leave them alone. That's been proven by a long, bloody history of continuous killing of Israelis by various methods.
Sure, Israel has struck back. It has done so in an effort to get terrorists to back off, but instead it has only increased Palestinian hate of Israel. Now Israel wants to stop the terrorists by capturing them where they live, hopefully once and for all.
But Israel will never be left alone. There is too much hate to allow that.
Edward Decker
I cannot help but wonder how much longer it is going to take for President Bush and his cronies to realize that the Israeli government is not going to do as he belatedly requested, i.e. withdraw their forces from Palestinian land. The rest of the world, more or less, has already condemned their actions. Now that Sharon has refused, what is Bush going to do, withdraw American financial aid and other goodies that the U.S. has handed Israel over the years? It won't help because, I believe, Israel is no longer dependent on the American government for assistance.
I believe that President Bush has painted himself into a corner and it will be interesting to see how he disentangles himself from this political mess.
Ron MacDonald
Yorkton, Saskatchewam
Hannan Ashrawi & numerous Palestinian spokespersons justify "Suicide
Bombings " as understandable acts of desperation arising from the so-
called Israeli occupation. A brief review of history proves this
position untenable: Since 1920 Arabs have attacked unarmed civilians.
Examples abound and include the massacre of Jews at Hebron, the killing of
Leon Klinghoffer on the Achille Lauro, murder of schoolchildren in
Ma'alot in Northern Israel and shooting Nuns and other innocents in Tel Aviv
airport and many many more examples.All this predates the Settlements.
Michael Daren
Toronto,Ontario
Israel is ruled by a war criminal whose goal is to rid Israel and the Occupied Territories of the Palestinian people. For 54 years the Zionists have been terrorizing, repressing, killing, massacreing and injuring the Palestinian people. They are bulldozing their homes, uprooting their olive groves, and constructing illegal settlements on their stolen land. They are supported in this by the United States Government which arms them to the teeth and gives them carte blanche to do as they please. The peace proposals which are imposed on the Palestinian people are unacceptable and are heavily biased towards Israel. The latest peace proposal by the Arab League was accepted by Arafat but soundly rejected by Sharon because it called for Israel to get out of the Territories which it is illegally occupying. This final solution is what the beleaguered Palestinians are fighting against. Anybody who has a sense of justice must see that it! is wrong to take other people's land, assassinate them, blow up their ambulances and doctors, bulldoze homes, torture people, and build settlements on their confiscated lands. This is the cause of suicide bombers. The suicide bombers have been pushed to the point where they want to strike back with all that they have which is themselves as a weapon. Israel with British and American support has caused this sorry state of affairs. I don't condone it. I think violence is not a solution and I would love to see peace because everybody deserves to live in peace and security.
I think most people can see the injustice of this. The Jewish people were persecuted under Hitler and now the Palestinian people are persecuted under Sharon. The United Nations has passed resolutions calling for Israel to pull out of the Occupied Territories and to dismantle illegal settlements there but Israel just ignores international law because they have the United States on their side. The Palestinians situation has steadily deteriorated from one successive Israeli administration to the next. When Israel did have a leader who was prepared to exchange land for peace that leader was assassinated by an Israeli.
The US should be putting pressure on both sides to disengage and they should insert an international force under UN auspices to keep the sides apart to calm the situation so that imposed negotiations can take place. The peace plan proposed by the Saudis which has been accepted by Arafat should be seriously considered. The murder of Palestinian and Israel citizens is in nobodies interest and needs to stop and I think it will only stop if their is a just settlement.
Dan Theal
I am very disappointed with the position of the Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham. I think that he and the prime minister are naive and a hypocrites. We have to back Israel as it was left with no choice but to go after the terrorists. This is what the Israeli government has been demanding from Arafat for the past 18 months and he did nothing. Israel has demanded a stop to the incitements which they promised to do since 1993 and they did not. What would the Canadian government have done if in the school text books they would be teaching children how to become suicide bomber? How would the government responded. Just look at our history when the war measure act was introduced in Montreal. If you give in to terrorists God help us.
Freddy Faust
What is the difference between the Israeli situation and the attacks on
the World Trade Center. Both are acts of terrorism and the United States
goes and retaliates as much as they see needed, and our own Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham
thinks Israel should talk of more peace. I think there is a double standard
here and that Israel should go in and take whatever force is necessary to
make the Palestinian's understand that they will not tolerate these
cowardless acts. As for Arafat he is just a deceptive leader and he in his
mind probably encourages these acts. I say, go in and show them what Israel
is reallly made of, they have my full support!
Jeremy Kerrigan
When will Canada's government get a spine? How does the
government think terrorism should be fought? Since
Oslo, when the PLO agreed to peace negotiations, there
has been non-stop terrorism. The sheer number of these
attacks indicates that this is not a random issue of
rogue elements, but that this is the strategy of the
PLO leadership. No country in the world would and
should stand for it. Israel does not want to send it's
people into combat, they were given no choice.
Therefore, I feel that Israel has to hit and hit hard,
so that the Palestinians will realize that violence is
not in their interest. In fact, what have the
Palestinians gained from all this but dead and
wounded, a shattered economy, mistrust from Israel and
the democratic world. They should be angry at their
leadership that has taken them down this path.
On what basis of trust do they think that Israelis
should provide them with any kind of concession?
George Muenz
Vancouver, BC
Any group that kills women and children and civilians, and then applauds it, deserves to go down, and that's especially so for our wonderful friends the Palestinians who, o gee whiz, they danced in the streets on sept 11th (really? Oh yeah, really).
To them fair game is any Israeli - woman, child, pregnant mother - they don't care. Well, it works both ways; I've stopped caring about the Palestinians. We send them money to educate their children, and they strike out all references to Israel in their textbooks, instead always instilling hatred for their neighbour and us too (the west), and we Canadians pay for that. I'd rather send the Israelis money to build an electric fence around them so the Palestinian madness stays outside.
So no I don't like them. I don't sympathise with them. They think by killing innocent people with their maniacal suicides it will somehow free them.
Well hey, isn't that exactly what Bin Laden was proposing?
Robin Smith
Palestinians have been under a brutal occupation for 35 years, which Israel has stated that they have no desire to end. The peace that Israel seeks is to keep all the land they illegally hold, and expel the Palestinians. This position is untenable in the long term. If Dutch and French civilians had the right to defend themselves against Nazi oppression in WW2, so do the Palestinians. The violence will only end when the occupation ends.
Neil Rollinson
Whitehorse Yukon
The struggles in the Middle East illustrate what can go wrong when people
delude themselves and expect the rest of the world to accept their
delusions. The Palestinians delude themselves that what they do is not
terrorism and not even violence while the Israelis delude themselves that
the continued occupation and settlement of the Palestinian homeland is not
a violent act and should be accepted peaceably even if they have to kill
thousands to gain that acceptance.
Mark Campbell
Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan
Although I personally think that the Israelis are only making more suicide bombers with their military terrorism, I understand their desperation to do something. But why not try truly ending the occupation, so that the bombers have no excuse? If necessary, they could probably reoccupy-- they have the military advantage.
Vito Nicastro
I am not Israelite or Palestinian however I feel that the following needs to stated.
It seems to me to be the height of hypocrisy for the Palestinian people to be calling on the world for peace and demonstrating in the streets when it is the Palestinians who make it a practice of bombing, maiming and murdering the innocent.
It is all very well to blame Arafat and the Hamas but the truth is that nowhere have we seen the Palestinian people deplore the vicious murdering of women, children and the elderly by these so-called martyr suicide bombers.
Until we see that Palestinian people, not just Yasser Arafat speak against these terrible acts of cowardice, will we be convinced that the Palestinian people are actually interested in a true and lasting peace.
The next time that the Palestinians feel like demonstrating, in the streets, they might consider demonstrating against the inexcusable and horrible loss of life, regardless of the race color or creed.
Aaron a Baker
Ottawa, Ontario
While Israel's handling of the Mideast crisis has hardly been exemplary, Yasser Arafat's posturing has left him in a position where he either doesn't really know what he wants or is pretending that he doesn't.
When he was offered 95% of his demands two years ago, it wasn't good enough; he thought he could get 110%. Instead he has has nothing except the loss of 1100 Palestinians. When he speaks in English to the Western media, he claims he's willing to trade land for peace; but when he addresses his people and the rest of the Arab world in Arabic, he states his ultimate goal is the destruction of the state of Israel.
What the Arab world needs is better leadership rather than the likes of Arafat, Saddam Hussein, Col. Qadaffi and Osama Bin-Laden, all of whom consider lives to be cheap including those of their own countrymen.
E. Katz
Winnipeg,Manitoba
The Israeli government must be condemned for its murder and mayhem in the West Bank. Their behaviour defies all international norms and must be condemned by the international community. I would expect the Canadian government to work with the United Nations to call for an international peace keeping force to go over there and keep the two sides apart. Any crimes against humanity should be prosecuted. There are reports that besides killing innocent people the Israeli Defence Force is interfering with the work of the Red Crescent Society. Israel must be treated like any other nation that breaks international law. Its leaders must be prosecuted. The same goes for Palestinians who break the law. It is about time that President Bush did something besides repeat his slogan we must fight evil and terrorism mantra. We need a more intelligent plan to come out of the American administration than what we have see so far. I hope the Canadian government will use any influence it has with the United States, the E.U. and the U.N. to come up with a plan to protect the innocent in the Illegally Occupied Territories.
Dan Theal
Ariel Sharon started with a walk to the Al Aqsa mosque and began the route
to chaos and genocide of the Palestinian people. Many of the early zealots of
the Zionist movement wanted the complete control and domination of the area
by driving out the existing population and replacing them with immigrants,
largely from Europe.
The Sharon government increased its drive towards this end on the back of
the September 11th attacks in the USA gambling that the US would be too
preoccupied to restrain him. He was right.
Canada cannot allow the extinction of Palestine. Our Government must insist
that the Palestinian state be finally established with as a viable political
and economic entity. This means pulling down settlements or turning them
over the Palestinian jurisdiction.
Terry Rooney
If Arafat had wanted a Palestinian State, he would have accepted the offer of Ehud Barak over a year ago. Arafat's goal is not the creation of a Palestinian State, but the destruction of the Jewish one.
Palestinian children who die are unfortunate victims caught in a of a war against adult terrorists. Israeli children are targetted victims of a war of genocide against innocent Jewish men, women, and children.
When Jews are killed in attacks, Palestinians dance in the streets. When Palestinians are killed, there is no such rejoicing among Jews. We regret not only the loss of human life , but also that we had to become killers, just to save our own lives.
Ruth Zimberg
Beit Shemesh, Israel
(formerly of Toronto)
I would like to comment on the government of Canada and it's reaction to
what is happening in Israel.
How can anybody interpret the act of suicide bombings , with the intent of
killing civilians in restaurants and public places as a way of negotiating
Peace
anywhere in the world. The Sept. 11 "Suicide Bombing" of the World Trade
Centre is regarded as an " Act of War " against all free citizens of the
world and we Approved the use of War against Afghanistan for the simple "
Suicide Bombing " because it was on our " Soil ".
Why is it wrong for the Isreali Government to consider " 55 " " Suicide
Bombings " on it's " Soil " an "Act of War " against it's State and why is
the world
not responding in the same way as it did to the attacks in the U.S.?
I would like to think that if a group of Peace Mongers decided to
start suicide bombing in Canada, to promote their ideas that the "government
of Canada" would take more of a responsible attitude towards the protection
of it's citizens than it seems to think the Israeli's should do.
David Sinclair
I can not comprehend what this madness will accomplish except more suicide bombings.
Israel has one of the most advanced armies in the world and Palistine has no military at all.
The world watches Israel raid the territories at will and shoot to kill without concern as to who dies.
We blame Arafat for people who have nothing to loose blowing themselves up in cafe's and buses.
We need to blame ourselves for calling ourselves civilized and doing nothing but watching.
Israel uses "terrorism" as the end all catch phrase. If Palistinians are terrorists, what are the Israelies?
Why isn't Sharon in the Hauge? Why isn't Arafat in the Hauge himself? Both these men have barbaric histories to answer for.
Between the two, they are allowing their people to die in vain.
Peace is a difficult process. Neither seem willing to honestly try.
I am honestly afraid that this may unite the Arab nations to settle their differences with Israel by eliminating Israel.
No, I am not Jewish; I am not Arab. Just a thirty year old White guy who is sick of hearing about killing in the name of Peace.
My parents taught me to look at people for who they are, not what language they speak.
R Galvin
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