Letter: Israeli settlements grow as Arabs fail to condemn Afula
Your support helps us to tell the story
This election is still a dead heat, according to most polls. In a fight with such wafer-thin margins, we need reporters on the ground talking to the people Trump and Harris are courting. Your support allows us to keep sending journalists to the story.
The Independent is trusted by 27 million Americans from across the entire political spectrum every month. Unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock you out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. But quality journalism must still be paid for.
Help us keep bring these critical stories to light. Your support makes all the difference.
Sir: Equating yesterday's massacre at Afula with the one in Hebron last February ('The need for a spirit of urgency', leading article, 7 April) hardly helps to balance the accounts of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
It must not be forgotten that Jews had been killed by the PLO, Hamas and Islamic Jihad for decades before Baruch Goldstein's name hit the headlines, simply because they were Jews and the region had to be 'cleansed' of their presence. Furthermore, the Jews' return to Zion had been endangered by Arab aggression and threats of annihilation since the 19th century.
The Hebron attack was carried out by one deranged individual; it could not have been foreseen neither could it have been prevented, but the Afula outrage had been carefully planned by a whole organisation with the aim to cause maximum deaths and destruction.
After Hebron, the president of Israel, the government and Israelis from right across the political spectrum expressed their shame and condemnation of what had been done, offering apologies, sympathy and compensation to the bereaved and wounded. After Afula, the PLO may have expressed 'regret' (in so perfunctory a manner that President Clinton pronounced it inadequate) but neither Yasser Arafat nor the heads of Arab states involved in the peace process have apologised for or condemned the massacre, and their silence speaks more clearly than words.
Yesterday's tragedy gave a clear insight into the moral difference between Jewish and Arab attitudes towards terrorism: for Jews it is a matter of shame and bitter self-criticism; for the Arabs it is a matter of policy or even strategy. The haste with which Hamas and Islamic Jihad claimed 'credit' for Afula suggests they are actually proud of it.
Yours sincerely,
R. WILLERS
Wembley Park, Middlesex
7 April
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments