IN RESPONSE TO NABIL SHA'ATH

Dear Nabil Sha’ath,

The article written by you in this week’s Haaretz is embarrassing. One could even ask why they printed what is basically a Palestinian rant, but then Haaretz’ slant toward anti-Israeli sentiment is well known.

Let us look at some things you had to say. “The peace process that began 17 years ago has repeatedly reaffirmed Palestinian recognition of Israel and its right to exist over 78 percent of our historic homeland.

Let us be very clear: long ago Israel recognized the rights of the Palestinian Nation.

In fact, it was Israel that brought about the Oslo Accords with the hope of finding a Palestinian peace partner to finally end the conflict between our country and the Palestinian Nation.

I am sorry but whose homeland is it?

Our country exists whether the Palestinians recognize it or not. Israel does not need your recognition that she exists. What does need to happen is the mutual respect of our nations, something you have not done.

That means you must come to grips with the fact that the Jewish Nation has just as much, if not more, right to statehood in the Land of Israel. That also means you must recognize Israel as the Jewish Nation State, something you still refuse to do. The land that makes up Israel is not the Palestinians and never has been. It is ours, has been ours and was ours long before the Arab nation knew where the Levant was.

Mr. Sha’ath, you may not be doing it intentionally, but your comment says Jews have less of a right to be here than the Arabs. You do not recognize the Jewish nation’s right to this land that was ours for centuries before your prophet Mohammad was born.

Here is another one of your brilliant comments. “The internationally recognized obstacle to peace is the ongoing Israeli occupation.”

You could not be more wrong.

Just because ten people decide to jump off of a bridge does that mean it is the right thing to do? Anti-Semitism has been popular the world over for centuries, does that mean it is good?

The “ongoing occupation” was created by the Palestinian Authority and Yasser Arafat when you all rejected Palestinian statehood and peace in 2000 and 2001 at Camp David and the Taba Negotiations.

Every world leader at the time, including President Bill Clinton, blamed Arafat and the PA for rejecting the best offer you would ever receive from an Israeli government. Worse, you and the rest of the Palestinian leadership (behind Arafat) followed up the rejection of Palestinian statehood, including an end to the “Israeli Occupation” and peace, with a gruesome terrorist campaign.

This was just confirmed two weeks ago by Hamas head Mahmoud Zahar. This terrorist campaign that you started hoping to get Israel to make more concessions, turned into Arafat’s War, also known as the “Second Intafada”.

Your love for delegitimizing the Jewish nation and Jewish Blood has always been the major obstacle to peace, always opting instead for terrorism. It was not and is not the settlements.

You continue your rant by slamming Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for doing what every Israeli leader should have done up until now: finally to demand that the Palestinians recognize the Jewish nation’s right to statehood and this land.

You say that no Israeli government has demanded this for negotiations up until now, apparently forgetting that your precondition of a freeze in settlement building was never a demand of yours for negotiations until now.

So it is all right for you to concoct preconditions -- ones the Israeli government met for 10 months (most of which you wasted), but Israel should not dare to challenge the Palestinians to be true peace seekers? Mr. Sha’ath, not every one who reads Haaretz is ignorant nor an appeasing sycophant.

You follow this up by attacking Prime Minister Netanyahu for demanding the Palestinians give up the Right of Return. You also demand that Israel take responsibility for the Palestinian refugee situation.

Your stance on the Palestinian Right of Return again exposes your true aspirations. There is NO legality to Palestinian Right of Return. UN resolution 194 is a non-binding General Assembly resolution suggesting the refugees should be allowed to return IF they do so peacefully. The Palestinians’ continued rejection of Israel from 1948 on negates that right.

On the other hand, UN Security Council resolution 242 states clearly that a just solution needs to be found for the refugee situation. That would indicate nothing about a return to Israel, but a return to a future Palestinian State, which makes perfect sense.

Mr. Sha’ath are you Palestinians also ready to accept responsibility for the Jewish refugees ejected from the Arab and Muslim countries after Israel’s independence? There were at least TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND more JEWISH REFUGEES than Arab!

Mr. Sha’ath, maybe you do not remember this, so I will refresh your memory. Here is a quote from your great friend and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. IN THE MARCH 1976 issue of Falastin a-Thaura, then the official journal of the Beirut-based PLO, Mahmud Abbas ("Abu Mazen", now Prime Minister of the West Bank PA), then a PLO spokesman, wrote: "The Arab armies entered Palestine to protect the Palestinians from the Zionist tyranny but, instead, they abandoned them, forced them to emigrate and to leave their homeland, and threw them into prisons similar to the ghettos in which the Jews used to live."

When it comes to taking responsibility for the cause of Palestinian refugees, you really must be kidding if you expect Israel to take this upon herself. It was the Palestinians and Arab nations that rejected INTERNATIONAL LAW when you rejected partition.

It was the Palestinians and Arab nations who declared a war of annihilation on the nascent Israeli State. It was your “nation” that promised to toss us Jews into the sea, to mass murder us and soak the land with our blood. THESE WERE THE WORDS OF YOUR PEOPLE, not ours.

Is it our fault that we did not abide by your hopes for another holocaust? I THINK NOT, Mr. Sha’ath. On that note, you and your people always try to dodge the fact that you were also implicit in the holocaust. The Grand Mufti Haj Amin El Husseini was one of Hitler’s buddies, and when he returned to the Land of Israel, his intentions during the Israeli War of Independence was to finish what Hitler started.

You continue your shameless lies by saying Israeli governments never have prepared the Israeli public for a two-state solution.

Mr. Sha’ath, you know this is simply not true. A poll released last Thursday by the Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace at Hebrew University and the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research in Ramallah goes even further to expose your lie, stating that if direct talks fail, 41% of Palestinians support the resumption of violence; 78% of Israelis support the continuation of direct negotiations, while only 30% of Palestinians do.

Which nation really has been preparing itself for mutual recognition and peace? The numbers say it all, Mr. Sha’ath, as do the books Palestinians use to educate their children. You still will find the must degrading and anti-Semitic rhetoric in these “educational” texts.

This all makes perfect sense; Israel since 1993 and the signing of the Oslo accords has been preparing her society for the acceptance of peace with the Palestinian nation. That acceptance means acknowledging a Palestinian State in Judea and Samaria on our land. That is right, Mr. Sha’ath; whether you like it or not, the land was called Judea and Samaria long before “West Bank.” Judea and Samaria have been part of the Jewish nation’s history long before your nation made it out of the sand dunes of Arabia.

Mr. Sha’ath, since you and the Palestinian leadership have done “so much” to accept Israel maybe you can explain why Saeb Erekat, your friend and comrade, in an interview with the Jordanian newspaper Al-Dustour promised the slow destruction of Israel and a Palestinian State that would be Jew-free? Does that sound as though you recognize or accept Israel?

Nabil Sha’ath, your distorted rant exemplifies the root problem with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: Palestinian leadership still refuses to take responsibility for its own actions. You behave like spoiled children who expect to get everything your way. You want recognition for your Palestinian nation, but refuse recognition of our Jewish nation. You demean Israel and the Jewish nation and spit on history when you say this is your land.

Nabil Sha’ath, save your lies for someone else. THE MAJORITY OF PEACE-SEEKING ISRAELIS ARE NOT BUYING YOUR FALSE GOODS.