Twitter trumps Facebook

I can certainly relate to Daniel Held’s recent fixation with Facebook in particular as a source of information about the recent war in Gaza (“Facebook in a time of war,” Aug. 28). In my case, the preoccupation has been with Twitter, which has proven to be an extremely efficient and addictive source of real-time updates, articles and opinions from an eclectic range of sources around the world.

One of the advantages of Twitter is that, unlike Facebook, one does not have to actually be accepted as a “friend” in order to follow virtually anyone in the Twittersphere. This makes it easy to follow people with vastly divergent views, including those whose opinions may be diametrically opposed to your own. If you are feeling open-minded, or maybe just curious about what others are thinking, it is a fairly simple task to follow the posts of people whom one would never have had the opportunity to communicate with in any other way. I am currently following dozens of individuals and organizations, who never would have accepted my invitation to connect on Facebook. This leads to a more dynamic and spirited environment, in which you can follow debates between people with very different opinions, and even contribute to the conversation. Of course, the downside is that these conversations can sometimes turn somewhat nasty.

I agree with Held that this type of activity can never replace real-world interaction. Yet as a complement to doing other things, such as actually leaving your basement and getting involved in a cause you believe in, the virtual world can provide an invaluable venue for educating yourself and developing your own opinions, before writing that letter to the editor or attending a rally.

Peter Mann
Hampstead, Que.

UN is guilty of war crimes 

The United Nations has let loose William Schabas, supported by UN Human Rights Commissioner Navi Pillay, to lecture and threaten Israel and to produce a report whose prejudicial conclusions will paint Israel in a bad light (“UNHRC commission chair dismisses allegations of bias,” Aug. 28).

Schabas and Pillay are part of an ignoble group of human rights violators that includes Algeria, China, Cuba, Kuwait, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. It is the UN, with its many anti-Semitic bodies, that is guilty of war crimes, not Israel.

The UNHRC feigns concern about the deaths of Palestinians, but not Israelis, Baha’is, Yazidis, Christians, gays or women. Israel tells civilians where to go to remain safe, while Hamas has killed people trying to leave and forced others to remain in the combat zones.

It is Hamas who is committing crimes against humanity and must be held accountable but, at the UN, racism and petro-dollars trump truth.

Len Bennett
Montreal

No platform for anti-Zionists

David Zinman and Sam Bick (“CIJA silences Jewish voices,” Aug. 28) allege that the Canadian Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs and Federation CJA are pursuing a campaign of intimidation within the Jewish community to “silence all dissent on the issue of colonialism in Palestine,” and further suggest that we conflate criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism. 

This discourse conveniently obscures the crucial distinction between criticism of Israeli law, policy and action on the one hand, and a denial of the right of Israel to exist and the right of the Jewish People to self-determination on the other. As self-professed “anti-Zionist Jews” Zinman and Bick take themselves out of the conversation about criticizing Israel, since in order to criticize Israel, one must first recognize its right to exist.

Anti-Zionist Jews are, of course, free to express their views in the democratic country of Canada, just as they are free to do so in the democratic State of Israel. Neither Federation CJA nor its advocacy arm, CIJA, has ever sought to censor these views, however misguided we believe them to be. Rather, we refuse to provide them a platform because we will not be complicit with actions or with speech that are antithetical to our mandate and that have the effect, if not the intent, of inciting hatred of Jews.

Deborah Corber, CEO Federation CJA
Luciano Del Negro, executive director, CIJA Quebec
Montreal