Letters to the Editor June 8, 2020: Flagging spirits

Readers of The Jerusalem Post have their say.

By LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Letters (photo credit: PIXABAY)
Letters
(photo credit: PIXABAY)
Flagging spirits
Regarding “Thousands protest against annexation in Tel Aviv” (June 7), there were two flags that appeared in the pictures of the demonstration Saturday night.
The first one is the old red flag. Bernie Sanders looked a bit anachronistic and slightly ludicrous with that flag as a backdrop. A photo like that could have been taken 100 years ago, backing the communists of those years. How many Jewish lives the communists cost us back then! How silly in today’s world!
But the second flag was even worse. There was the PLO flag, under which our people have been slaughtered for decades and until this very day.
And Bernie Sanders lapping up the adulation of people who should know better and who possibly never read a history book in their lives. Like so many Americans, he thinks he can give us advice on how to survive in this neighborhood. Please. He didn’t even have the grace to appear in person. He just gave us advice electronically.
Palestinian lives matter? Well, Jewish lives come first.
THELMA JACOBSON
Petah Tikva
It’s a riot
After watching the tragic news,, I was surprised to read the article with the headline “Democrats urge police reform as marches continue” (June 7).

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In many cases, these were neither marches nor demonstrations, but riots and insurrection. The editorial on Israel’s potential annexation in the same edition seems to have a better perspective on the situation by correctly labeling it as “riots in more than140 cities across the US.” There were scenes of total destruction of stores throughout Manhattan, major name brands and minority-owned stores alike. Jewish owners of one jewelery store were heard pleading with looters, “Please leave us alone, we’re on your side” before the inevitable plundering happened.
Retired police captain David Dorn was killed attempting to defend a friend’s pawn shop. Ask the liberal US media whether his black life mattered.
DAVID SMITH
Ra’anana
The Black Lives Matter Manifesto claims that Israel is perpetrating genocide against Palestinian Arabs and that Israel is an apartheid state. That same Manifesto supports the BDS movement of Omar Barghouti, who has said the sole purpose of BDS is the “euthanasia” of the Zionist dream of Israel. Barghouti knows full well that the Nazi T4 Euthanasia Program was the foundation of the Final Solution of the Jews as enacted in the Wannsee Protocol in January 1942.
Compare the wisdom and prescience of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who said at Harvard a few weeks before his death: “When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews; you’re talking antisemitism.”
So it is no surprise that Black Lives Matter, with its antisemitic ally, Antifa, this week desecrated synagogues and Jewish-identified businesses across America, including  Congregation Beth El on Beverly Blvd. in Los Angeles, Beit Medrash Kehilat Yaakov (Rabbi Bess’ shul) in Los Angeles, Rabbi Ganzweig’s shul in Los Angeles and Beth Ahabah in Richmond, Virginia. Jewish businesses vandalized in California include Ariel Glatt Kosher Market, Mensch Bakery and Kitchen, Syd’s Pharmacy and Kosher Vitamins. 
The antisemitism of Black Lives Matter and Antifa and their supporters demonstrated by their enthusiastic desecration of synagogues and businesses is in the tradition of the Kristallnacht of November 9-10, 1938.
RICHARD SHERMAN
Margate, Florida
Thump Trump
“Who torched America” (June 5) falsely blames US President Donald Trump for igniting people into committing acts of arson, pillage, and looting. It claims that these people were only reacting to humiliations, libels and scorn inflicted upon them by the president.
Needless to say, it does not offer any evidence to support this deflection of guilt. Furthermore, it commits the dishonesty of falsely claiming that Trump said “a white supremacist mob included good people,’’ a claim debunked long ago. A quick search on YouTube yields several clips showing what Trump actually said after the Charlottesville rally, and in particular his unequivocal condemnation of white supremacists and neo-Nazis.
In sum, this article is nothing more than an apology of crime – caused by blind Trump hatred. It should have been rejected for publication.
OSCAR VOLIJ
Metar
If memory serves me, there was some time in the past when Amotz Asa-El did sometimes represent the views of Middle Israel. Now, like many opinion writers, he just wants to flaunt his hatred of US President Donald Trump. And, as with many on the Left, he cannot explain that hatred in any reasoned way. Is he unhappy that Trump has been the best president for Israel ever? Is it the fact that Trump improved the US economy, including instituting policies that helped the lives of minorities more than any other US administration? Is it that he reshaped foreign policy so that the US supports like-minded pro-Western democracies at the expense of the enemies of democracy?
Regardless, now Asa-El’s complaint is that Trump somehow killed George Floyd and destroyed race relations in the US. So, in a country of almost 350 million people there are some racist cops… who would have guessed? Four of them, in arresting a career criminal who was in the act of committing one more crime, kill the arrestee. The answer to this is to arrest the criminal cops, not loot and destroy stores all across the US, commit mayhem and murder complete innocents. I suggest  that the root causes of the rioting lie not at the feet of Trump; but, rather, in the desire of the Left to destroy America’s basic values by enlargement of government’s control of citizens’ lives- – making people less free, less self-reliant, and ultimately more prone to police abuse.
CHAIM ABRAMOWITZ
Jerusalem, Israel
Sovereignty: Dire warnings
Regarding “Berlin ups pressure on Israel to nix annexation amid calls for sanctions” (June 7), the foreign minister of Germany, a first-generation descendant of the people who devised the “final solution” for the Jewish people, is coming to Israel to warn of serious consequences of annexing 30% of the West Bank.
This takes “chutzpah” to a whole new level.
After 2,000 years of persecution, blood libels, forced conversions, expulsions, confiscation of assets, pogroms, rape, and finally the murder of six million Jews, I feel that Europe has no moral authority whatsoever to lecture Israel on what is good for the Jews.
The moral compass of the EU has been drowned in a barrel of Middle Eastern oil.
NEVILLE BERMAN
Ra’anana
Regarding “British Jewish leaders express concern over annexation plan” (June 7), again we have the usual so-called prominent British Jews telling Israel what they should and shouldn’t do. It would be more appropriate for them to address the subject of antisemitism in their own society. Over the years, other than addressing and calling out that arch-villain Jeremy Corbyn, their silence generally on the issue has been quite deafening.
STEPHEN VISHNICK
Tel Aviv
“Israel’s new disengagement plan” (June 7) is quite right that the implementing the Trump plan does not involve “annexation,” but with respect, it is not the government that has adopted this misnomer. It is the media, including Israeli media, that choose a single word that misleads by not describing what legally is happening. Their choice of “disengagement” is also not accurate to get across that what is involved is simply the application of Israeli civil law to a designated territory that will embrace the Jordan Valley and the main, if not all, Jewish communities in Area C of the Oslo Accords.
Disengagement was indeed the accurate word for the Sharon plan of Israel leaving Gaza, but it is not an accurate term for the current situation. Israel is not at this moment irrevocably leaving the rest of the area commonly known as the West Bank and certainly not changing anything relative to the rest of Area C. It remains undecided and pending negotiation – if there is to be any – with the Palestinians in the next four years
It is unfortunate that the media want to describe something with a single word; adopting vocabulary from past situations is not the answer. In “Israel is missing a huge opportunity” (June 5), Ambassador Danny Ayalon shows how one can write about the situation accurately without using the words “annexation” or “disengagement.”
PETER SIMPSON
Jerusalem
“Could Palestinian enclaves without citizenship mean apartheid? (June 4) calls attention to the issue of Palestinians residing in enclaves in Israeli territory but without Israeli citizenship. It notes that there are those who argue that if Palestinians are annexed, they need to be granted citizenship and the right to vote either in Israel or in Palestine.
The American example should be considered. In addition to the 50 states, the United States has commonwealths, territories and possessions. The most well-known are Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. Residents of these areas are US citizens but cannot vote in federal elections. They have representatives in Congress who can vote only in committees.
Israel should be clever enough to figure out a similar solution when annexation becomes a reality
JAY SHAPIRO
Jerusalem
That settles it
Regarding “Keep on building!” (June 4), Gershon Baskin is entitled to his opinions, counterintuitive as they may be, but he is not entitled to his own facts nor to print inaccuracies that are demonstrtively false.
Israeli settlements are not located “in occupied territories... illegal by international law,” but are on lands illegally occupied by Transjordan following Israel’s War of Independence and conquered as a result of Jordan’s unprovoked aggression against Israel in June 1967.
These lands were designated to be the home of the Jewish people as cited in the Balfour Declaration, enshrined in the San Remo Mandate resolution of 1920 and incorporated in the UN Charter – never abrogated.
United States Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared to the community of nations that Israeli settlements are not inherently illegal in a reversal of Obama’s perfidious position in the UN on the eve of his departure from the White House.
Legal scholars such as Eugene Kantrowitz and others who are infinitely more qualified than Baskin to express opinions of settlement legality have repeatedly made the case for the legitimacy of Israel’s settlement enterprise.
JOEL KUTNER
Jerusalem
Regarding “Law in the Negev” (June 4), the lack of urgency and systematic incompetence in the Negev regarding Bedouin organized crime against the IDF is a classic example of Israel’s failure to enforce the rule of law throughout the country.
One of the most egregious failures is in the West Bank’s Area C, which has already been predetermined to belong entirely to Israel under any new territorial agreement. Israel has allowed Palestinian encroachment, funded by the EU and its members, plus a number of unfriendly NGO entities, to change the facts on the ground against our best interests.
It’s the same way everyone turned a blind eye to the hijacking of our government by the High Court. It’s the same way Israel has given control over the Temple Mount to foreign interlopers. Can you imagine another scenario anywhere in the world today where countries (Saudi Arabia, Turkey) are vying for control over another sovereign nation’s strategic physical and spiritual heartland, and right in the center of its capital? And there are many more examples of Israel ceding control over important areas vital to her security, for just a lack of will to protect its citizen’s rights and safety.
 It doesn’t bode well for annexation, especially when dealing with an intractable enemy that understands and respects only strength and the will to use it while excelling at taking advantage of any small sign of weakness Israel might display. Today’s government is huge by any measure. Mandate a couple of superfluous ministers to keep their eye on these potentially highly destructive lack-of-action areas and policies so we can protect all of our interests and secure our future for generations to come.
ALLAN KANDEL
Los Angeles
All is well at Hadassah
“The Corona rebel” (June 5) was excellent and informative. From personal experience, it is obvious that Prof. Zeev Rotstein’s management style reaches down to his amazing staff.
When the COVID-19 pandemic broke out, I called the Hadassah Ein Kareem Oncology Outpatient Department (known as “tipul yom”) to ask if chemotherapy patients would receive treatments as usual. The reply was, “But of course. The treatments must continue.”
The department abided by strict guidelines – all staff wearing masks, the registration desk covered by plastic curtains, seating in the waiting room rearranged to allow for social distancing and family accompanying patients forbidden from being with their loved ones during treatments as is the norm in non-pandemic times.
The entire professional staff, whether they be Jewish, Muslim, Christian or Druze, including doctors, nurses, technicians, secretaries, orderlies, maintenance staff and volunteers worked diligently to provide comfort to both patients and family in such trying times, which is the case even if there was no pandemic.
It is apparent from the article that this attitude applies throughout all departments in the hospital.
And for those who allege that Israel is an apartheid state, please take note of the above interaction of staff, which also applies to the patients themselves without regard to religion, race or creed.
AVRAHAM FRIEDMAN
Ganei Modi’in
Heartbreak Hotel
Regarding “A honeymoon destroyed” (June 7), we are aware that after the long period during the COVID-19 epidemic, while the market was frozen – including the hotel industry – and we were required to close down the hotel, there were a few problems, and we are sorry about them.
The day that the writer and her husband arrived at the hotel was an especially busy day in which many guests were checking out, while other guests were just arriving at the beginning of their holiday.  As a result, some of the guests had to wait to receive their rooms.
These were the first few days after the hotel reopened, and as a result, the staff as well as the guests were just getting used to the new regulations.
To our delight, the hotel’s staff is now fully compliant with the regulations, and the many guests who have stayed in the hotel over the last week, including this past weekend, are happy and satisfied with their holiday.
It’s a shame that the writer, who has already publicized her experience on twitter and sent video clips to  Channel 12 , did not make an effort to approach an official representative from the Nakash Group, owners of the Setai Sea of Galilee Hotel.
EYTAN LOEWENSTEIN
Spokesperson, Setai Sea of Galilee Hotel
Editor’s note: As reported in the story, the manager of the hotel refused a request by the writer to comment.