By LETTERS TO THE EDITORLetters(photo credit: REUTERS)Nation-State LawRegarding “Only Jews can stop this disgrace” (August 7), calling Israel the nation state of the Jews in no way affects the democratic nature of the country, nor is it a serpent’s egg waiting to hatch into a downslide in civic, ethnic or national terms for its non-Jewish citizens. This Brutus thinking led to the stupid and useless assassination of a very great man.Does Mohammad Darawshe wish to lead himself and his people into stupid and useless actions? Or is this rant the writer’s yearning for the demise of Israel and the slaughter of all its Jewish citizens as ostensibly required by the Koran?Calling the push for the Nation State Law “irresponsibility” and “braggadocio” does not make it so. The law simply aligns our country with what is common in the rest of the world. England is for the English, Spain for the Spanish, France for the French, Italy for the Italian, Japan for the Japanese and so on. Do citizens of these countries who are not of the same ethnicity enjoy any less civil rights as those who do?So let’s not get carried away. Jews have returned to their ancestral homeland after 2,000 years of exile and much suffering. We have a right to our nation state, to be proud, not only to call it so, but also for the democracy we practice, giving every citizen all the rights that go with it and equality under the law.EDMUND JONAHRishon LezionMohammed Darawshe warns that Israel is on the road to becoming a selective democracy in 2019, like South Africa under Apartheid. He predicts that soon, very soon, Israel may revoke his citizenship and right to vote, usher him to the back of the bus, cancel National Insurance payments for Arabs and prohibit the use of Arabic.Does he really believe that this will happen ? Will he eat his turban if in 2020 he discovers that his hysterical fears did not materialize? More importantly, will he be disappointed that they did not materialize ?YIGAL HOROWITZ
BeershevaOne of the principal responsibilities of our Minister of Justice is upholding and protecting the rule of Law. Ayelet Shaked’s widely reported threats of earthquakes if the High Court determines to overturn the Nation-State Law not only amount to an aberration of her judicial role but in certain parts of the free World would be considered acts of incitement or sedition.Given her apparent knowledge of earthquakes, she should redirect her boundless energy into addressing the real danger of such disasters in our land, predicted by experts as highly likely, against which our government has lamentably failed to protect us.AUSTEN SCIENCEHerzliyaThe Druze demonstration in Tel Aviv ended with the singing of the Israeli national anthem and a declaration of loyalty to the State of Israel. This proves that the Druze and their leaders are wiser and more mature than those who incited them to demonstrate.The Druze have always realized that they are better off in Israel than any minority in any Muslim country. Yet it is not easy to be an Arab in Israel as long as there is violence is encouraged by the Muslim leadership while the majority who prefer to live in peace remain quiet.CHARLES ORENHerzliyaI suggest that the Arab parties suing in the Supreme Court for equality under the new law agree that all of their 18 year olds report for military or national service.ZVI FINKModi’inFeminist/queer issue?In “What happened to you, Cory Booker” (August 7), Shmuley Boteach omits one important aspect when discussing the BDS t-shirt slogan “Palestine is a Feminist/ Queer/ Refugee/ Racial Justice Issue.”That slogan is an expression of the fashionable “intersectionality”philosophy to which left-wing or Antifa (anti-fascist) supporters in America have become enslaved. It forges a link between all manifestations of oppression, however diverse. Female victims of sexual inequality are related to black victims of racial inequality and to victims of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender inequality, etc.Antifa, which has swallowed the BDS doctrine in its entirety, decrees that Palestinians are quintessential victims. Their villainous oppressor is Israel, which it accuses of every sort of monstrous criminality. This new-wave philosophy posits that if one opposes racism, homophobia and sexism, then one must oppose Israel, and by extension all who support Israel and all Israelis, most of whom happen to be Jews. This philosophy is embraced by Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of Britain’s Labour Party, and his extreme left-wing supporters.This is why the recent Charlottesville violence in the US differed from the seminal anti-fascist Battle of Cable Street in the London of the 1930s. The Cable Street anti-fascists were Jews supported by non-Jewish friends, neighbors and fellow workers, who hated the antisemitism of the Black Shirt leader, Oswald Mosley and his bully-boys, and were determined to make a stand against them.Antifa, on the other hand, contains within itself an antisemitism as hateful as that mouthed by the fascists it opposes.NEVILLE TELLERRamat Beit ShemeshInclude captives in dealRegarding “Goldin and Shaul” (August 7), how arrogant of the writer to show such little sympathy for the parents of the two deceased soldiers and the other two missing Israelis – other than a condescending reference about how we all just wish for their return and how we all feel the pain and unimaginable suffering for the Goldin and Shaul families.True, we don’t want to release over 1,000 terrorists, many with blood on their hands, as in the Gilad Schalit deal, but somehow the media and many representatives of the Left wanted Schalit freed at any cost. Though I am happy that he is back home, we must do more to get our soldiers and civilians back to Israel. The writer is so concerned about losing a deal with an arch enemy of Israel that he is willing to concede to Hamas’ and let our families suffer indefinitely so Hamas can be heroes in the in the face of the Gazan people.Israel must include these captives in any deal. They shouldn’t give an inch of breathing room for Hamas until they release the young men and the bodies of the soldiers. It should be a non-starter to capitulate once again to our enemies and if Hamas wants another war we should make it the final confrontation.What are we waiting for? Lets be as pro-active for these boys as the country was for Schalit – except, of course, we must dictate the terms of any deal.JONATHAN SURASKYRa’ananaIndustry of liesThe article “NBA team asked to cut ties with company supplying Israeli forces” (August 6) highlights an example of a widespread malady whose common cause is seldom explained clearly.A sports team is being pressured to cut ties with a firm that sells sporting optics and binoculars, because this firm also supplies its products to the IDF.In explaining the opposition to their team supporting the optics firm, an apparently key supporter of the sports team, Olivia Katbi Smith, co-chairwoman of Portland’s Democratic Socialists of America, describes the IDF as “...a murderous death squad that upholds apartheid through continuous brutalization of Palestinians.”I see only two possible explanations for her expressing such ridiculous malevolent statements quoted from the Palestinian “industry of lies.”1) She is the type of person who, if someone claimed in the local papers, that a member of her family had perpetrated some ghastly action, would immediately accept the story and condemn and abandon that member of the family without further question.2) She is simply a grossly antisemitic bigot happy to spread wild, vicious lies about Jews, no matter what.These two common phenomena, separately or combined, explain the huge support in the West for the Palestinian anti-Israel and anti-Jewish narrative.CHARLES SMITHMoshav ShoreshVegan zealWhy is it that when reading a letter from a vegan one always gets the uncomfortable sensation that their zeal transcends personal enthusiasm and enters the dark realms of evangelical totalitarian dictat. If Shoshana Dolgin Be’er (Letters, August 6) is to be believed, we would also need to consider the methane output of countless millions of wildebeest and other ungulates across the entire face of the globe, which far exceeds that of those of the domestic kine of which she complains.For the moment, then, I propose to continue to enjoy my fillet steak and my shepherd’s pie and leave her to her nut cutlets.STANLEY COHENBaka, Jerusalem
