Do Palestinians want peace?
You seem to reserve an inordinate amount of space to inane articles about the Middle East dispute, ‘A protest deferred” (January 8) being a particularly good example. Written by Ilham Rawoot, a guest of the Palestine Solidarity Alliance, which coincidentally favoured your newspaper with a full-page advertisement in the same issue, the article was rather like a restaurant review where the reviewer had had her meal paid for by the reviewee.
The article elevated a childish jaunt into a world-shaking event, with the 15-strong South African contingent lauded by the equally world-renowned Scottish Palestine Solidarity Committee as ‘platinum”. Dissatisfied with Egypt’s response to their irritating demands, they are now considering adding Egypt to the non-existent Israeli boycott, and therefore may as well add Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and most Arab states, if they wish to be consistent.
The truth, to which these activists will remain eternally blind, is that Egypt and those other Arab states are not against Israel but with her in the war against the real enemy: Iran and its war-mongering, anti-modern spawn Hamas. Those who genuinely have the interests of Palestinians at heart (and that certainly does not include the Israel-haters behind the campaign) should think through the issue, free of emotional propaganda, and support the secular and modern forces who see the defanging of Iran and Hamas as the first and essential step to progress in that region. — Sydney Kaye, Cape Town
In ‘Crushed under Israel’s boot” (January 8), Dr Neve Gordon writes that he has been asked why the Palestinians have not established peace movements as the Israelis have done. He answers: ‘A peaceful grassroots movement has always existed.” He insists that ‘in the past six decades Palestinians have continually deployed non-violent forms of opposition to challenge the occupation”.
His six decades of ‘non-violent opposition” takes us back to the 1950s. I worked in Israel then and was aware of the murderous attacks launched within the country. Every explanation of Palestinian attacks on Israeli civilians contains the word ‘occupation”. Well, at that time there was no Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, unless these peaceful souls are referring to the fact that Israel was allocated a state by the United Nations.
One obvious answer to the question about the lack of Palestinian peace movements is that the Palestinians don’t want peace. At the time of partition in 1947 the Palestinians were offered their own state. They refused it, believing that by attacking the future state of Israel they would gain much more.
After Israel’s pre-emptive Six Day War in 1967, it found itself in control of the Sinai Desert, the West Bank, Gaza, East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights. This was not a war of conquest but to remove an existential threat.
Having removed that threat, Israel offered to return much of the West Bank and Gaza to the Palestinians in return for peace. On September 1 1967 the Arab League met in Khartoum and rejected Israel’s peace overtures. It proclaimed: ‘No peace with Israel, no recognition and no negotiations.”
Gordon states that after September 1967 Palestinian leaders did not initiate terror attacks. I have before me a statement of terror attacks carried out in Israel proper between March 1968 and November 1970 only, a period of 32 months: 47 were killed and 306 wounded. They included 90 children, 24 soldiers and three Arabs.
In 2000 Bill Clinton met Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat at the Taba conference. The object was peace. Barak offered to return Gaza and 97% of the occupied West Bank for peace. Arafat’s response was to launch the ‘second intifada” against Israel. The result was 1?000 Israelis and 3?000 Palestinians dead.
It also led to Israel erecting a security wall that reduced deaths at the hands of Palestinian suicide bombers by at least 90%. Separate roads for Israeli and Palestinian traffic reduced drive-by shootings considerably.
For over 100 years the Palestinians and other Muslims have proclaimed hatred of Jews from their pulpits, in their press and in their schools. They have been responsible for at least 10?000 deaths of Jewish men, women and children. Is it not time that they stop their hatred and aggression and reach an accommodation with their Jewish neighbours? — Don Krausz, Killarney
Professor Gordon is in a unique position in the Middle East. He is a professor at an eminent university and, as a citizen of one of the world’s most democratic countries, he is allowed to express his disdain for Israel’s policies.
The Israeli government is not above reproach and academics and the free press are allowed to do what they do best: criticise and shine a light on the dark corners that need illuminating. The same cannot be said for their counterparts in the Palestinian territories, where any kind of press (unless it bears the Hamas seal of approval) is banned, peace movements are a pipe dream (especially when one grows up indoctrinated that you too can become a martyr) and genocidal charters are the ideology on which government policy is based.
Peace is a duet and not a solo dance. If blame is to be levelled at Israel, does it mean that the Palestinians are absolved of any accountability or responsibility? — Rolene Marks, Media Team Israel, Edenvale
In brief
I must commend the M&G for bringing the Schabir Shaik matter to the fore (December 23). This issue has many a South African seething. However, half the story seems to have been rehashed. Also, the manner in which Dan Olofsson is portrayed seems unethical and biased. What makes him ‘well connected”? Is he really ’controversial”? When you write about Shell or Toyota, do you refer to them as ‘controversial”? They also have been accused of this and that in the past. I hold no brief for the man, but I think your representation of Olofsson is character assassination. — Maupi Monyemangene,
Botlokwa, Limpopo
Andrew Kenny’s projection that those who believe in climate change are similar to Aids denialists (Letters, December 18) is remarkable. Instead, it is climate sceptics like Kenny and Kelvin Kemm who are analogous to Aids denialists. No matter how much hard scientific data you share with these blinkered fools, they insist their hollow theories actually hold water. Enough of their rubbish, already! — Glenn
Ashton, Noordhoek
John Carlin’s letter (December 18) in response to Shaun de Waal’s review of Invictus is the most polite and elegant ‘Fuck you” I have ever read. Respect! — Bruce Clark, Jo’burg
Analyse this, Professor
In ‘A wounded nation” (December 23), Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela attempts to psychoanalyse the white South African populace and comes to some alarming conclusions.
In her opinion, the anger and frustration whites feel is due to their loss of the privileges they enjoyed under Nat rule. If that were so for the majority, it would be tragic and an insult to the many of the previously advantaged who took part in the struggle for democracy and who today serve in countless charities.
As one white South African, I will try to analyse myself. Yes, I do feel a lot of anger and despair. But it is not because I don’t qualify for elitist privileges or resent black people because they are now more empowered to live the life they choose. I feel only relief that apartheid has gone and I celebrate that fact. But for me there is a tremendous sense of disappointment at what our new democracy has been able to achieve.
Gobodo-Madikizela need only look at the first few pages of the Mail & Guardian of December 23 and its 2009 Report Card to see what I mean: underperforming ministers, corruption, lack of service delivery, fancy cars and big hotel bills while the ‘poorest of the poor”, as politicians like to refer to them, are worse off than ever. South Africa is rich; we have a strong economy and a sufficient tax base to provide for everyone. But cronyism, corruption and mismanagement of funds are steadily, year on year, eroding our chance of being a stable, prosperous country.
That, Professor, is why I despair. I don’t presume to talk for the rest of my kind, but I know many of my friends — white and black — concur. We are all sick of greedy, self-centred politicians and public servants. Unfortunately, their behaviour has done nothing to instill confidence in the ANC-led government.
The professor also notes that there were mostly whites at the December 16 reconciliation pilgrimage and a dearth of people ‘from the townships”. Yet she criticises whites for non-participation in our new South Africa. — Yvonne Fontyn, Cresta, Johannesburg
Put schools to test
Despite South Africans’ inherited and self-imposed differences, we are alike in the rituals we perform every year-end. This is highlighted by our collective response to the matriculation results.
Almost on cue, we heave a shared sigh of disappointment when we are told how many young lives will be excluded from the work and education mainstream.
We hold many responsible for our distress, save the caretakers responsible for managing schools properly. How many times have we agreed to act on those who are letting down our young people? ‘Accountability” means holding liable those who are holding the future of our children
to ransom.
I read that surveys show 51% of South Africans have no books in their homes and a mere 14% of the population reads books, while only 5% of those read to their children. Even more upsetting is the realisation that the billions we spent to recapitalise libraries have not been followed up by a spirit of urgency from parents and teachers to ensure that our children make use of
these facilities.
WEB Du Bois said that the ‘object of — schools is intelligence, broad sympathy, and knowledge of the world that was and is”. In our year-end rituals, let us try to impart in small but meaningful ways the training of ‘quick minds and pure hearts”. — Jeffrey Sehume,
Kwa Thema
Party delusion
I wish to place on record a number of facts that should have been solicited by the Mail & Guardian before publishing a story covered by lies (“A hat too many?”, December 18). You say ANC Siyanda district regional secretary Deshi Ngxanxa resigned from the South African Communist Party (SACP) in support of Julius Malema. Comrade Ngxanxa was a member of the SACP in the Dora Tamana district, but his membership lapsed in 2007.
He ditched the party to advance his narrow personal interests. He does not belong to our branch of the SACP and his resignation is a figment of his imagination. — Reginald Ntlanganiso, SACP branch secretary, Paballelo branch, Dora Tamana district