By LETTERS TO THE EDITOREnvelope(photo credit: ING IMAGE/ASAP)The threat..As I watch the news coming in from Europe and the US, I am amazed by the inability of these world powers to actually see what is coming their way, with the total intention of wiping out the status quo.Maybe it is just the Jewish mind that can foresee events that are about to happen – although here in Israel, we also do not preempt some events despite warnings we get.Wake up everybody! Your coffee is getting cold! When jihadists tell you that you are about to die, believe them!S. GELGORTel Aviv...and the cureHow do we handle Islamic State? Simple. The free world must send a military coalition backed by US air power, and destroy ISIS. No negotiations. Take no prisoners. ISIS is a cancer in the Middle East that threatens the entire world. There really isn’t any other way unless you’re willing to fight on for many years at an extremely high cost of life and property. If we are to survive, ISIS and its ilk must be wiped off the face of the earth.HERB STARKMooresville, North Carolina
Fits the descriptionLast Thursday, in an op-ed piece in The New York Times, the French novelist Michel Houellebecq, author of Submission, called French President François Hollande an “insignificant opportunist” and Prime Minister Manuel Valls a “congenital moron.”What are the chances that a well known American novelist, say Phillip Roth, might call US Secretary of State John Kerry a “congenital moron”? After all, Kerry fits the description much more than Valls.MLADEN ANDRIJASEVICBeershebaDoes he care?As of Sunday, November 22, I had yet to hear a condemnation by US President Barack Obama of the Palestinian Islamic radical who last Thursday murdered Ezra Schwartz, a US citizen spending his gap year studying at a Jewish seminary in Israel (“5 killed in terrorist attacks in Tel Aviv, Gush Etzion,” November 20).Could it be that the location of the attack, Gush Etzion, is problematic? The core group of Gush Etzion communities includes four Jewish agricultural villages that were founded in 1940-1947 on property purchased in the 1920s and 1930s, and destroyed by the Arab Legion before the outbreak of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, in what is called the Kfar Etzion massacre. Where was the world outcry? Apparently, only the recapture of legally purchased Jewish land during the 1967 defensive war is problematic.Could it be that the MASA program in which Ezra was enrolled, which included delivering meals to Israeli soldiers protecting Gush Etzion residents, was problematic? The MASA Israel Journey is a top-notch international experience connecting young Jewish adults (18-30) to internships, service learning or Jewish studies programs in Israel to help them grow as people, professionals and leaders.Well, the lives of Jewish seminary gap-year students in Israel matter to me. They include the life of Ezra Schwartz, which was purposely taken in the name of Islam, and the life of my grandson, who is now studying in a seminary in Jerusalem.HARVEY KASDANJerusalemClouded by smokeRegarding “EU envoy: Israel cheapens Holocaust by linking it to settlement product labeling” (November 19), it seems that Ambassador Lars Faaborg-Andersen and the EU are grossly insensitive or, excusing the Holocaust analogy, their judgment is clouded by the smoke of the crematoria for which their continent is uniquely infamous.JONATHAN FELDSTEINEfratTolerating treasonWith regard to “Cabinet outlaws northern branch of Islamic Movement” (November 18), the definition of treason is showing no loyalty to your country, especially by helping its enemies.If whichever branch of the country’s Islamic Movement opposes the state and advocates its destruction, it and its followers are acting in a treasonous manner and should be prosecuted. If MKs from the Joint List advocate the destruction of the state, they should be prosecuted for treason, too.A state that tolerates treason is doomed to failure.KAL FEINBERG JerusalemRights v. obligations\Your news item about an out-of-court settlement bestowed on a self-declared enemy of Israel (“Prof. wins $600k after losing job over anti-Israel tweets,” November 18) unfortunately epitomizes for me the malaise that has crippled today’s western, liberal societies.Prof. Steven Salaita’s immediate reaction was to call it a “victory for academic freedom and the First Amendment.”Every time some objection is raised to the outrageous behavior of people like him, these people trot out the standard defense of freedom of expression. Even in the aftermath of the recent horrendous events in France, liberals state that making any generalization about Islam or Muslims is an infringement on someone’s rights.Sadly, we never hear from these people a statement of obligations.Do citizens not have an obligation to behave in a manner that ensures public well-being? Is there no obligation to inform authorities when radicalization is going on in front of them? Do refugees from other countries have greater rights than those who are already citizens? Have we reached the stage where rights trump all else? I would take it as a mark of respectability if every time the people who trumpet a “bill of rights” gave equal space to a “bill of obligations – although doing so would cut the ground from under their self-righteous feet, so don’t hold your breath.HENRY KAYE]AshkelonDifferent times Sharon Udasin’s “Israel, China sign joint agricultural action plan to strengthen cooperation” (November 16) brought back fond memories.In 1981, I received a phone call from a branch of the United Nations, informing me that the People’s Republic of China (PRC) had asked that I be invited to come and advise on systems of integrated farming. At the time, I was working at the Dor Fisheries Research Station, a branch of the Volcani Institute. Obviously, it was a dream invitation.Why the invite via the UN? Because it would be another decade before China established relations with Israel. They told me that as an Israeli, I would be coming “under the radar.” My Chinese contacts told me (though I do not know if this was true) that I was the first foreign adviser to be invited in this way.In 1981, China had recently climbed out of its cultural revolution.There are many stories juxtaposing the China of today to the China of that time. Most telling is the key to my room in the Hu Bin Hotel.Key? The puzzled hotel clerk asked via my interpreter why I wanted a key.At the start of my stay, I was given a per diem expense allotment in cash for the entire month.In the room, there was only a small cabinet with one draw. There was no place to hide what exceeded the clerk’s annual salary. That was why I wanted a key.I never got one, and really didn’t need one.GERALD SCHROEDERJerusalemCLARIFICATIONS • “No deterrent” (Editorial, November 22) failed to note that a sixth victim of the Har Nof synagogue massacre of November 18, 2014, died of his wounds on October 23, almost a year after the attack.• In “The living remember the dead” (November 20), The Jerusalem Post in no way sought to convey the impression that any of the Nazi camps in Poland during the Holocaust – whether death camps, concentration camps, slave labor camps or facilities of any other type – were “Polish” camps.
