Letters, June 3, 2011
Obama’s faith in Palestinians mistaken
PRESIDENT Barack Obama may deliver poetically written words with silky smoothness, but his endeavours to unravel the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are all founded on one basic assumption, and that is that the Palestinians actually want the conflict resolved. History shows that this assumption is false.
Since 1948, the Arabs have rejected every single offer to bring the conflict to an end and have not presented one alternative proposal other than that which would result in the demise of Israel.
Their actions over the decades have raised several obvious questions that bear repeating: if the Palestinians want us to genuinely believe they seek an end to the conflict, why do they continue to vilify Israelis and Jews in their media on almost a daily basis?
Why do they continue to launch terrorist attacks, most of which are fortunately foiled by Israeli vigilance? Why do they indoctrinate children from kindergarten age up about the illegitimacy of Israel? Why do they continue to honour terrorists by naming public institutions after them? And why has Fatah joined hands with the vile Hamas to augment the ‘resistance’?
Unfortunately, the Palestinians have a friend in President Obama who they know will apply pressure to Israel but let them off lightly on all these issues, describing them only as unhelpful.
No, the Palestinians don’t want peace; they want victory.
ALAN FREEDMAN
St Kilda East, Vic
Bibi’s courage in challenging President
YES, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, 100 times ‘Yes!’ to your speech in Washington, which explained, in such a clear and dignified way, the principles that Israel stands for.
You arrived to meet President Barack Obama two days after nakba when hundreds of so-called refugees attacked our borders, but the President was tone-deaf to your concerns. He supports only the Palestinian demands – the return of Israel to the 1967 border, to whitewash the criticism of Hamas and to leave the negotiations about the refugees in Jerusalem to after the new borders have been implemented.
To the Jewish audience of AIPAC, the President sang the same tune, but to sweeten the message he sprinkled a nostalgic reference to our 2000-year exile from Jerusalem (it is interesting that in his speeches for the Arab public, in Cairo in 2009 and on May 17, 2011, no reference was made to the role of the Jews in the history of the region).
While the openly pro-Arab position of President Obama makes us more vulnerable to the aggression of our neighbours, Mr Netanyahu has the courage to confront the most powerful man in the world, and to do it in his capital in front of the elected representatives of his people.
Addressing the US Congress, Mr Netanyahu talked openly about the non-defensible 1967 borders, about the problem of refugees, about Hamas and most importantly of all, about the necessity of the Palestinian recognition of Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people.
At the same time, Mr Netanyahu stated that Israel is ready to be generous with the Palestinian people, and would accept a demilitarised state along our border. The Congress responded with 26 standing ovations. The leaders of the House, and of the Senate, distanced themselves from Obama’s statements about Israel’s final borders.
Caroline Glick rightly wrote in The Jerusalem Post that this was a Churchillian speech – the speech of a leader with a real vision for the future of his people.
Prime Minister, we stand behind you, and we thank you from the bottom of our heart for your courage, wisdom, and faith in our future.
BELLA MEYLIKH
Elsternwick, Vic
Acknowledging first owners was right
I FEEL sad, angry and very frustrated at some of the changes that are happening in Victoria under the new Liberal Government. In particular, I find appalling Ted Baillieu’s statement that a welcome to country and acknowledgement of our country’s first people is no longer necessary at public events.
Timed as it was, shortly before National Sorry Day on May 26 and Reconciliation Week, it appears to be designed to cause maximum pain to our indigenous Australians.
Acknowledging original owners was never compulsory, but had become custom at most public gatherings in Victoria. It served a role to educate white people that we are, in fact, all immigrants of recent arrival. The longest a white person can claim their ancestors have been on this land is a little over 200 years. For our indigenous people, we know it to be at least 40,000 years.
As a Jew, I am particularly offended by this reversal. We Jews share a deep attachment to land, our particular piece of land on the planet, as do the indigenous tribes. We also share suffering caused by ongoing attempts at genocide, as do our original Australians.
The welcome to country and acknowledgement of our first Australians is not tokenism, even if it feels that way for some. It plays a role in creating awareness and memory in generations from now on. Removing it feels a lot like Holocaust denial to me.
Before people scream at me for using the comparison the Holocaust, please look at the definition of genocide according to international law.
Our indigenous people were only recognised as citizens in 1967, and the statistics of life expectancy, health, education, housing, employment, in fact every indicator of quality of life, fall way below that of other Australians.
The one statistic that is higher for indigenous Australians is incarceration. We have a long way to go before they are treated with true equality before the law and in terms of taxpayer dollars spent on providing basic services to them. A lot of taxpayer money has been thrown at the “Aboriginal Problem”, (see the similarity in language?), but as with current initiatives regarding housing for aborigines in the Northern Territory, most of the money goes to white bureaucrats.
To deny our original owners their small token of recognition is to exploit the white sense of entitlement to this land and all of the resources within it, and to give tacit approval to the ongoing dislocation, cultural destruction and death by a thousand cuts of our indigenous people.
William Cooper brought a group of Aboriginal people to the German embassy in 1938 to protest the German treatment of its Jews. In his honour, and because it is the right thing to do, I ask all Jewish Australians to acknowledge the first owners of the land on which they stand, at every public event.
HEATHER ABRAMSON
Caulfield, Vic
Recognising original ownership of land
GOOD point you make, Alan Freedman (AJN 27/05). If the Palestinians should make it a practice to recognise the traditional owners of the land of Israel, how more offensive of the Baillieu Government to scrap the practice of recognising Aboriginal ownership of this land.
And relax, all those who were swayed by Binyamin Netanyahu’s reaction to Barack Obama’s speech. As the foreign editor of The Australian, Greg Sheridan said on ABC 774 radio, the 1967 border has always been the tacit starting point for negotiations with the Palestinians and Mr Netanyahu’s rebuttal was to appease the ultra-right in his government.
HENRY HERZOG
St Kilda East, Vic
Misogynist’s triple flight of fancy
ANTIPODEAN Anecdote (AJN 27/05) included the following:
“… a woman who doesn’t speak a word of English and whose face looks like it could do with a good ironing …”; “… as I changed into the [batik] shirt in the airport toilet … and inspected myself in the mirror, there staring back at me was a Jewish grandmother on a cruise ship”; “…what I thought was cool and culturally appropriate looked more like a blouse, and one sported by a woman of a certain age trying to appear “with it”, and possibly on the hunt for her third or fourth husband”.
In one short, supposedly humorous article about his trip back to England, Zeddy Lawrence managed to be offensively misogynistic three times. Does he have a problem?
I’m a Jewish grandmother. I wouldn’t be seen dead in batik or on a cruise ship, and I couldn’t be bothered to get the iron out for the wrinkles. I’m also a Pom and my family and friends are used to my “unfortunate dress sense” and Oz accent. Get a grip, Zeddy!
ROS COLLINS
Elwood, Vic
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