It’s Appeasement
NEW YORK – A unilateral Israeli withdrawal from parts of Judea-Samaria and Gaza will make it easier for terrorists to operate and will send a message that Arab violence will produce Israeli concessions, the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) points out.
ZOA National President Morton A. Klein said: “Rewarding Yasir Arafat and his terrorist Palestinian Authority regime by unilaterally giving them more land, removing anti-terror checkpoints, and expelling Jews from the territories is appeasement, will reward Palestinian Arab terrorism and teach the terrorists that more violence produces more concessions.”
The ZOA President added:
* Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s remarks indicated that he believes such concessions are necessary to preserve good relations with the United States. Such an assumption is erroneous. There would be widespread support among the American public and Congress for an Israeli position against making concessions to the terrorists.
* Unilateral withdrawal will not bring peace. The world will continue pressuring Israel to withdraw even further, terrorism will continue, and Israel will have even less land from which to defend itself.
* Expelling and transferring Jews from their homes and towns is morally wrong. Jews should have the right to live wherever they choose in the Land of Israel, the Jewish people’s 3,000 year-old homeland. It is bigotry to demand that 200,000 Jews cannot live among two million Palestinian Arabs, just as one million Arabs live among five million Jews in Israel.
* Halting construction within existing Jewish towns is harsh and unfair. It will choke off normal life, by preventing families from doing simple, necessary things such as building a nursery for a new baby. It would prevent adult children from living near their parents. Why is there no demand to stop Palestinian Arab illegal building in the territories until the final status of the territories is decided?
* Removing anti-terror checkpoints will make it easier for terrorists to reach Israeli targets. The inconvenience caused by such checkpoints is nothing compared to Israelis losing their lives in attacks by terrorists; just as the inconvenience caused to American airline passengers by security checks is worth it, to save lives.