Election reflections

Much has been written on the pages of The CJN about former prime minister Stephen Harper’s incredible support for Israel and what that means to the Jews. Since the election, there have been several analyses of the results.

The strong Zionist in me who is outraged by the world’s unfairness to Israel and who has a son and his family living in Jerusalem deeply mourns the passing from office of the greatest foreign friend Israel has ever had as head of a government.

The patriotic Canadian, and lover of democracy in me, voted enthusiastically to have him removed from that job and rejoices in our success. The man was not good for this country.

Now what we supporters of Israel need to do in the next while is hold the Liberal government to its promise to be a good friend to the Jewish state. That would start by opposing the many preposterous resolutions that are routinely put to the United Nations General Assembly by various Jew-hating dictatorships and spineless European governments, as that party failed too often to do in the past. They can still support the rare reasonable one that may come up. 

Ken Frankel

Montreal

Finding partners for peace

The Oct. 22 column, “In Israel, terror and frustration abound,” implies that the Israeli government is somehow absolved from responsibility with the rise of the current terror wave in Israel.

Editor Yoni Goldstein asks, “But what can Israel do? There is no one to talk to about peace on the Palestinian side, and no clear method to curtail the violence.” There are many in Israel and in the Diaspora who would disagree with such an assessment. A senior IDF official, Alan Nitzan, testified that right-wing extremist settlers in the West Bank are fuelling Palestinian violence and terror. Nitzan related that both the activities of IDF soldiers and West Bank settlers are viewed by Palestinians as perpetuating the occupation.

Some would argue that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has failed to provide security to Israeli citizens and is simply managing the conflict with a reactive policy. If Netanyahu recently declared that territorial concessions towards establishing a Palestinian state are inevitable, then why not agree to the diplomatic parameters of two states based on the peace proposal of the previous Israeli government? Why lead this territorial conflict into becoming a religious conflict? Is it not time for Netanyahu to stop avoiding  his and the nation’s obligation to make peace with the Palestinians?

Smadar Meiri

Thornhill, Ont.

Look at Abbas, not the Mufti

Much has been made of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s misstatement that it was the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem who convinced Hitler to implement the final solution.

Let’s concentrate on relevant misstatements by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas that there were never any Jewish Temples and that Jesus Christ was a Palestinian. Hitler needed no encouragement in his effort to annihilate the Jewish People.

Bert Raphael

Toronto