The Feb. 6 editorial “Israel’s retreat on the peace front” was a disgrace and a slap in the face to the Jewish community. The Israeli electorate’s apparent desire for a victory by Ariel Sharon was hardly, as the editorial called it, a “national tantrum.”
Under siege since September, is it possible that the Israeli public, which continues to experience the ongoing campaign of Palestinian violence, is feeling just plain terrorized?
Try to imagine the horror and futility of proposing unprecedented concessions as the Israelis did, while their partners in peace, as part of the process of “negotiation,” were sacrificing the lives of their own children to manipulate world opinion.
Daily, Israelis have had to watch the senseless slaughter of innocent civilians.
After months, this steady diet of unrelenting violence against civilians, to which the Tribune refers to as a mere “uprising,” has led the Israelis to the conclusion that the policies of appeasement as implemented by the Barak government have not only taken them well off the road to peace but, worse yet, left them with an empty tank in a dangerous neighborhood. This is less secure than when the Oslo process commenced seven years ago.
Chiding an Israeli public that would risk war for promises by Sharon of a firm hand employs a gross double standard. Better we should view the likely course of events from the perspective of a nation, that, with levels of provocation far less than those suffered daily by Israel, invaded Panama and Grenada. Or perhaps an honest conversation with Neville Chamberlain about the productive role that the policy of appeasement played in 1938 would set the record straight.
