Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, May-June 2009, pages 77-78

Other People's Mail

Compiled by Kate Hilmy and Delinda Hanley

War Crimes in Gaza

To The Independent, March 28, 2009

The compelling and disturbing testimonies by Israeli soldiers reaffirm that war crimes were committed in the Gaza Strip, and confirm the deliberate killing of innocent civilians and destruction of civilian targets. (“Israel’s dirty secrets in Gaza,” March 20.)

The soldiers corroborate eyewitness accounts, human-rights reports, and U.N. statements about the illegal conduct of Israel’s armed forces in the occupied territories.

Numerous international politicians have promised an independent international inquiry into the conduct of Israel and of Hamas during the conflict. Nothing has happened. Yet again, Israel may not be held accountable for its crimes, echoing its impunity after its recent atrocities in Lebanon in 1996 and 2006, Gaza in 2006 and in the West Bank in 2002.

The only way to prevent such terrible scenes of wanton destruction and loss of life in the future is to ensure that there is no escaping international justice for the perpetrators of war crimes.

John Austin MP, Dr. Phyllis Starkey MP, Dr. Brian Iddon MP, Martin Linton MP, Sarah Teather MP, Andy Slaughter MP, Neil Gerrard MP, Colin Breed MP, Clive Betts MP, Emily Thornberry MP, Alistair Carmichael MP, Chris Doyle, Council for Arab-British Understanding, London

Post-Gaza Education

To the International Herald Tribune, March 20, 2009

The Israeli authorities’ ideas for countering the post-Gaza war isolation—sending well-known writers and artists abroad to educate the world about our situation—are worthless.

We Israelis certainly have some pretty things to show the world but that doesn’t make the Gaza adventure or the new right-wing government any less ugly.

The results of the recent elections and the shameful behavior of our soldiers in Gaza, details of which are now coming out, indicate that it is not the world we need to educate, but our own citizens.

Bianca Schlesinger, Tel Aviv, Israel

Is Anti-Zionism Hate?

To the Los Angeles Times, March 21, 2009

As an American Jew raised in a large, loving Zionist family, I have seen the blindness that allows otherwise ethical people to champion a state that has stolen another people’s homeland, a state in which non-Jews are despised, third-class semi-citizens.

Judea Pearl’s essay reflects the Zionist rationalization for 61 years of colonial aggression: Because the Jewish faith was born in Palestine, the Jews apparently had a right, after 2,000 years, to claim the Palestinian homeland as their own and send its terrorized population fleeing into refugee camps.

Zionism does not deserve the support of any American who is committed to justice and democracy.

Steve Kowit, San Diego, CA

Israel’s Contempt for Life

To The Independent, March 26, 2009

Your article about Tristan Anderson brought back strong memories of when my son Tom Hurndall was shot in Gaza in 2003. My heart goes out to Tristan Anderson’s parents, for I remember clearly how it was in the days after Tom was shot by an Israeli sniper in Rafah while rescuing Palestinian children.

Like us, his mother and father will be utterly devastated, numb and overcome by disbelief. As Americans, they will be reaching out for the support of their government and, maybe, stunned by the same astonishing level of Israeli obfuscation and cover-up that we experienced. I have come to recognize this feeling when reading the accounts of recent Israeli atrocities and civilian deaths during the incursion into Gaza.

Contrary to my own family’s experience when we called for and received the support of numerous parliamentarians in the UK, Tristan’s parents may have a hard time harnessing the energies of their government and insisting the Israeli government investigates properly, investigations that should never be done in-house. I recall with sadness how difficult it was for Rachel Corrie’s parents, Americans, to get truth and justice for their daughter, being given no government support after she was run over by an Israeli army bulldozer.

We’ve had little indication of how the new American government will respond to Israel’s incursion into Gaza, the stance they will take over the scores of civilian killings and iniquitously loose rules of engagement that killed Tom and so many others that were followed by inept investigations. A state’s response to the shooting of a young man who was demonstrating peacefully is a litmus test of the quality of inclusive justice we have a right to expect across the world. In accordance with international law, the policymakers, the chain of command and the soldiers, all must be called to account.

For the sake of Tristan and his parents, I hope President Barack Obama’s administration uses this opportunity to speak out against the Israeli policies, indeed any state’s policies, that show such contempt for human life.

Jocelyn Hurndall, Friends of Birzeit University, London

Torture and the Rule of Law

To TheNew York Times, March 19, 2009

“Tales From Torture’s Dark World,” by Mark Danner, reminds us in great detail that the fundamental human rights of detainees were indeed violated consistently over a period of years.

The “alternative set of procedures” used by American personnel included slamming detainees repeatedly into a wall using a neck collar for leverage, confining detainees in a coffinlike sensory-deprivation tank, forcing detainees to urinate and defecate on themselves, and waterboarding. These amount to war crimes.

Permission to use these tactics was sought and given by some of the most senior figures in the Bush administration. It is a national scandal that the highest-ranking American held criminally accountable for the systemic abuses committed in American-run detention facilities in Abu Ghraib, Bagram Air Base and the various “black sites” operated by the CIA is a junior noncommissioned officer.

Mr. Danner’s article is a timely reminder of why there must be a nonpartisan and independent inquiry into detainee treatment and policies. Accountability is the cornerstone of justice. We will not be able to restore America’s reputation in the world until we can demonstrate that we hold our own leaders to the same standard that we hold those in other nations.

Tom Parker, Amnesty International,  USA, Washington, DC

A Nominee’s Withdrawal

To The New York Times, March 13, 2009

Charles W. Freeman Jr.’s withdrawal of his name from consideration for a top intelligence post amid pressure from pro-Israel groups reveals a disturbing undercurrent in American politics: criticism, no matter how legitimate, of Israeli actions will not be tolerated.

Freeman’s comments about Israel addressed specific Israeli policies that he believed were counterproductive. They hardly constituted an “irrational hatred of Israel,” as Sen. Charles E. Schumer claimed.

While Israel’s policies have generated controversy even within Israel itself, discussion and debate of these policies are conspicuously absent from the political arena in the United States.

Data, not dogma, should drive America’s foreign policy decisions. When unconditional support for a foreign country becomes a prerequisite for governmental positions, the very tenets of our democracy prove precarious.

Jeffrey D. Stein, Potomac, MD

Competing Accounts

To The Washington Post, March 16, 2009

The Post’s March 12 edition made for fascinating reading on the subject of Charles W. Freeman Jr.’s having withdrawn his nomination to head the National Intelligence Council.

The lead editorial [“Blame the ‘Lobby’“] dismissed his portrayal of efforts by the “Lobby” to control the discussion of Israeli-Palestinian issues as a conspiracy theory and “crackpot” tirade, thus proving he was a bad candidate for the job. But on Page 1 and the op-ed page, staff writer Walter Pincus [“Intelligence Pick Blames ‘Israel Lobby’ for Withdrawal”] and columnist David S. Broder [“The Country’s Loss”] detailed exactly how the disparate elements of the “Lobby” that doesn’t exist worked to derail the nomination. So who’s right?

As a former Foreign Service couple who know Mr. Freeman—by reputation and his observations over the years in person and in print—to be one of the smartest, most objective and most honest products of the U.S. diplomatic establishment, we will go with Mr. Pincus and Mr. Broder. We also trust that Post readers who research these issues carefully and objectively will come to the same conclusion.

Albert and Parvin Fairchild, Bethesda, MD

Military “Defense” Isn’t

To The Washington Post, March 14, 2009

The recent leak of a document purported to be from my client, Ramzi Binalshibh, and the other four accused of being involved with events relating to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks confirms that no defendant can get a competent defense in the military commissions system (“Military Judge’s Release of Pleading by 9/11 Defendants Draws Criticism”).

Even as Mr. Binalshibh’s attorney, I was not informed of or shown the document until its release.

While President Obama ordered use of the commissions system stopped, such manipulation demonstrates that as military defense counsel, I am not even a cog in the commission wheel; I am a pebble on the side of the road, kicked aside by the behemoth political machine inside government that is running my client’s case to his certain death.

And we are all the worse for it, because neither our nation’s principles nor the lives of those lost on Sept. 11 are vindicated in such a system.

Suzanne M. Lachelier, Arlington, VA

Cheney and Obama

To The New York Times, March 20, 2009

Re: “Cheney Says Obama Has Increased Risks.” I have to give former Vice President Dick Cheney credit: his hypocrisy still makes my jaw drop, even after all these years. If we are indeed attacked by terrorists again, I hope we’re smart enough to realize that actions that caused additional millions to hate us were more likely a cause than were President Obama’s steps to bring us back to our own Constitution.

We’d have to see through self-serving, legacy-embellishing people like Mr. Cheney, but we should be pretty good at that by now.

Dan Carsen, Birmingham, AL

Out of Afghanistan

To the San Francisco Chronicle, Feb. 23, 2009

Americans who supported Barack Obama for president are deeply concerned that he plans to send 30,000 more U.S. military personnel to Afghanistan, bringing the American troop commitment to 60,000 or more.

Many Americans voted for Obama because we felt he would realize that Afghanistan has been a deadly quagmire for every occupier for centuries. Most recently, the Russians pulled out, many of their soldiers heroin addicts. The Brits left, as they were being picked off one by one in the mountains. We are not at war with Afghanistan, but we are making war on her people and creating lasting enemies in the process. Some of us would like to see some of the touted change we can believe in, not Predator drones raining death on civilians. Let’s bring our troops home now.

Frank DiMarco, Portland, OR

Reform in Saudi Arabia

To The New York Times, March 7, 2009

King Abdullah’s commitment to reform in Saudi Arabia is genuine; as the custodian of Islam’s two great mosques, he is open to working with religious moderates, and that is changing attitudes across the Middle East.

I have had the privilege of working with King Abdullah on a number of occasions, most notably as a participant in the international interfaith forum he gave in Madrid and as a member of a select group of religious leaders he convened during his most recent visit to New York and the U.N.

He has a sincere interest in enacting real initiatives to strengthen relations and bridge the gap between Muslims, Jews and other religious groups around the world.

Instead of questioning his commitment to reform, we should applaud King Abdullah for tackling the most pressing issues of the 21st century and for diligently working to curb religious extremism.

(Rabbi) Marc Schneier, New York, NY