Letters to the Editor

July 8, 2009

Has the Clock Struck Midnight?
David N. Myers seems to think that because “most analysts concur” that an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement would encompass Israeli retention of the largest Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, most Arabs concur as well (“Has the Clock Struck Midnight?” June 19).

They do not. Not only has Mahmoud Abbas and his Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority (PA) made it abundantly clear that they do not accept the presence of any Jews in a future Palestinian state, but they do not even accept the legitimacy of Israel as a Jewish state.

Only in April, Abbas stated, “I say this clearly: I do not accept the Jewish state, call it what you will.” Muhammad Dahlan, formerly a Fatah commander in Gaza, stated this rejection succinctly in March: “We demand of the Hamas movement not to recognize Israel, because the Fatah movement does not recognize Israel, even today.”

For these reasons, Myers’ observation that, “It is naïve to believe that a fledgling, fragile and demilitarized Palestinian state would happily welcome the presence of tens of thousands” of Jews misses the point: if Palestinians cannot accept a Jewish presence in a future Palestinian state, that fact itself is indication enough that they are not prepared to live in peace with Israel.

Who is prepared to argue that a people that resolutely insists on throwing all Jews out of their country, that criminalizes the sale of land to Jews and that lynches those deemed guilty of “collaborating” with Israel by having sold land to Jews is actually ready to live in peace alongside the Jewish state of Israel?

Morton A. Klein, National President, Zionist Organization of America, New York