Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, August/September 2000, Pages 3, 77-79

Letters to the Editor

 

Israel's Quneitra Withdrawal

While living in Kuwait in the mid-'70s, I happened to see a video documentary in the home of a Jesuit priest that he claimed a BBC news crew made just prior to and shortly after the Israeli withdrawal from Quneitra, Syria. I've forgotten the withdrawal dates, but I believe that the original occupation was a result of Israeli advances in the Six-Day War of 1967. Shortly before the Israeli departure and returning the city to Syrian control, the background scenes of interviews from the BBC video shows a still-standing and healthy, if not vibrant Quneitra. Within a few days after the Israeli withdrawal (as I recollect), and just before the Syrian army returns to the city, the BBC film crew showed subsequent video scenes of a Quneitra that had been destroyed. In the video, the British claim it was the Israeli army that systematically dynamited Quneitra into oblivion and rubble. The Israelis denied that they were the cause of the destruction and claimed it had been the result of heavy Syrian bombardment and tank warfare.

The film had a relevant bearing on the facts as to when Quneitra was destroyed and by whom. I was told by the Jesuit that the film crew had been unsuccessful in getting their video aired in England and that the video had been taken to the major networks in the U.S. who not only rejected the video, but refused to allow the film to be viewed even if the owners paid for the air time themselves. I've obviously forgotten a lot of the details and my memory has dimmed with the passage of time, but I am trying to track down the video. Would the Washington Report have any other information or knowledge of the Quneitra incident, particularly where I might find a copy of the video that was filmed by the BBC crew?

Gerry Manderscheid, Tucson, AZ

The video we saw at the time (and we've been personally to Quneitra since its destruction, and also on both sides of the Israeli border crossing a couple of hundred meters from the city which the Israelis looted and then flattened just days before the withdrawal and long after the shooting had stopped) is available from Howard Films, 55 Cedar Top Lane, Front Royal, VA 22630, for $25 plus handling.

 

Nothing Like It

Enclosed please find a check for $60. Please let the money go to subscriptions of your choosing.

I so enjoy your magazine. There is nothing else like it in this country. I have learned a lot about our country and its passionate relationship with Israel from reading your wonderful publication and also from the many books I have ordered through the years from you.

Enclosed please find an article from the Baltimore Sun May 29, 2000 written by an Israeli soldier. I think you will find it very interesting, especially coming from such a Zionist paper as The Sun. Also enclosed, is a "Letter to the Editor" that I wrote to the Sun regarding the article that they printed.

Barbara Gravesen, Ellicott City, MD

We thank you for your contributions, both financial and editorial, and have reprinted James Ron's powerful article on p. 22 of this issue.

 

Better Distribution Needed

I still view the Washington Report as one of the very few unsuppressed voices in North America. It saddens me, however, that in five years of residence in the U.S., I have yet to see the Washington Report on display in any of the bookstores I visit. Even if I ask about it, no one claims to have heard about it.

I am a Jordanian and I really would like to read more about Jordan. I think the Jordanian news is significantly under-covered considering the role it plays in the region. I hope this does not sound like a biased opinion.

Eyas Hattab, Mountain View, CA

The magazine is in some large newsstands, probably at least one in most major cities, but both the distributors and the outlets take some abuse. One dealer we approached in Grand Central Station said bluntly, that the (East) Indian company that controls those outlets would fire him if he stocked it. Readers can do a great service if they follow this up personally in their hometowns. Ask your local bookstore to call our wholesale magazine distributor, Ingram Periodicals, Inc., at (800) 627-6247 to set up an account. If the retailer or bookstore can't get a regular shipment that way, contact us.

Our international distribution is improving. We recently received a note from travelers to Lebanon who found our magazine in bookstores in Beirut. As for Jordan, we've tried for years to get a correspondent there. But it never lasts. Maybe times will be different under King Abdullah, who so far seems like our kind of guy.

 

Call the U.S. Sanctions and Bombing a Holocaust

There's a word in the English language that describes the horrific condition of Iraq today under the U.S.-led sanctions and bombing. That word is Holocaust.

Despite most commentators' reluctance to use the word except for the Nazi persecutions of World War II, the Iraqi casualties justfy the propriety and even the inevitability of the word. If, as an alphabet soup of United Nations agencies have for years reported, 5,000 Iraqi children have died monthly since the end of the U.S.-Iraq war in 1991, over the past 10 years 60,000 children have perished annually. That, by itself, makes the characterization both proper and inevitable.

I have not seen U.N. figures about adult casualties, but Iraqi Americans have advised me that the U.N. estimate is low for child casualties, and that an additional third as many adults are dying as children. These deaths stem not only from famine and disease but also as a result of unceasing U.S. attacks.

Making a conservative estimate of total deaths, therefore, one reaches a figure of 800,000 deaths in Iraq since the end of the U.S. war. That estimate tragically, horribly, incredibly describes a holocaust by any definition that Noah Webster would have accepted.

In ceding the term exclusively to what happened in World War II, all of us have been selling short the innocent children and people of Iraq. I'm not prepared to do this, and I hope others aren't either. So I offer a $500 initial contribution to any organization that is willing in its literature to call the extermination war against Iraq by its necessary and proper name--Holocaust.

And what if the word should ignite a controversy? Fine. That's the objective.

Mitchell Kaidy, Rochester, NY

 

Must-Heed Books

Can you offer a British book in the Washington Report's book catalog? A book called The Palestinian Exodus 1948-1998 has come to my attention. I would love to purchase it, but it is so expensive--$75 Canadian. It was published in 1999 by Ithaca Press, part of Garnet Publishing Ltd., 8 Southern Court, South Street, Reading RGI 4QS UK. It consists of scholarly but dynamic chapters edited by Ghada Karmi and Eugene Cotran.

From the start of the foreword: "The State of Israel was founded in 1948 on force and violence. That was not particularly remarkable. What was highly unusual, though, was that Israel was also founded on a crime and a lie, or rather on two crimes and a lie..."

Another book I discovered that I think others would like is Ropes of Sand, by Wilbur Crane Eveland, although this book was published in 1980 by W.W. Norton and Co. This book has what looks like the definitive story behind the USS Liberty, and claims that U.N. Resolution 242 refers not to pre-1967 boundaries, but to 1948's! The author was a "former adviser to the CIA and former member of the policy-planning staffs of the White House and Pentagon.

Keep up the wonderful work.

Karin Brothers, Toronto, Ontario

AET Book Club Director Hugh Galford is investigating the availability of The Palestinian Exodus 1948-1998, and suggests you check the Book Catalog's "New Arrivals" page for the next few issues. Ropes of Sand is out of print, but you may be interested in the profile of Walter Crane Eveland that appeared in the March 1990 issue of the Washington Report, following Eveland's death in January of that year.

 

Is FLAME Related to CAMERA?

We hope you at the Washington Report or ADC or the Palestinians up at the United Nations or somebody will address this ridiculous CAMERA ad from The New York Times that appeared on June 21, 2000 that I am enclosing.

Who funds CAMERA? Is it related to FLAME? I haven't seen a CAMERA ad in years but the format of CAMERA ads used to be similar to the format of the FLAME ads. What is the Center for Monitoring the Impacts of Peace? Is it as phony as it sounds? How did the Center obtain these purported textbooks that say "...the final and inevitable result will be the victory of the Muslims over the Jews."? Who translated the purported textbooks?

Why would the Palestinian Authority have to teach Palestinian children to "hate Jews"? My guess is that Arabs in general and Palestinian Arabs in particular don't "hate" Jews any more than they love them. They have every reason to loathe political Zionism--one of the most vicious of all the morally bankrupt frauds ever perpetrated on an unsuspecting world in all of history--and to despise its devotees. They don't have to teach their children what political Zionism has done to the non-Jews of Palestine whose interests the Balfour Declaration so piously promised to protect. And just why does the Zionist enterprise have a "right" to exist on stolen Arab land at the expense of the non-Jews of Palestine and the American taxpayer?

The ad refers to "Peace Education" in Israeli schools, "teaching respect, tolerance and reconciliation with the Arabs." When exactly was "Peace Education" introduced? What ages study it? Do the children of Arabs who hold citizenship in the Jewish schools also study "Peace Education"? Or is it reserved for Jewish children?

There's a wonderful line in (I think) one of Kingsley Amis' books that goes something like this--"We don't hate you because you are English. We hate you because you're you." I always think of that line when Zionists scream about "anti-Semitism."

Thanks again for all your good work.

Karen R. Bossmeyer, Louisville, KY

 

Fanning FLAME

Mitchell Kaidy's excellent letter (July 2000) about the activities of the ill-named "Facts and Logic About the Middle East" (FLAME--much more accurate) deserves a few added comments.

FLAME's paid ads are now appearing in The New York Times. I'm sure the Times had to wrestle with the decision to run them, but given the Times' posture as damage control center for the State of Israel, I'm not surprised. My guess is that they turned down FLAME for a much more influential "op ed" page ad. The tenor of FLAME's approach continues in its "foaming-at-the-mouth" style in the Times' ad of July 10. They managed to pull off explaining why "the Arabs" have no real interest in Jerusalem without mentioning the Dome of the Rock. Not even a hint. The trouble is that 90 percent of the people reading the ad don't know any better. This kind of lying is effective.

Kaidy also reports that the IRS brushed off his friend's inquiries about FLAME in 1993 by saying that FLAME was the responsibility of state tax authorities because FLAME was incorporated under state laws. This is arrant nonsense. ALL tax-exempt organizations (with rare exceptions not likely in FLAME's case) are initially incorporated under state not-for-profit corporation laws. FLAME's ads now claim that they are tax-exempt under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code.

This requires a ruling by the IRS. I don't know whether FLAME had qualified for section 501(c)(3) status when Kaidy's friend made his inquiry, but it is likely. Under that code section an organization CAN be exempt from federal income tax (and provide a tax deduction for contributors) under arcane rules allowing a minimum of "political" activity, including some "attempts to influence legislation" (the big no-no). The IRS is overwhelmed by the sheer number of tax-exempt organizations and does a poor job of auditing them. Also many do not comply with State reporting requirements. This should be pursued.

Albert Doyle, via e-mail

 

Questioning U.S. Support

Tell us about Hamas. Does the U.S. support dictatorships in the Middle East because they are easier to control than democracies? The U.S. supports military control in Turkey over a democracy.

Does the U.S. discourage cooperation between Arab countries?

Lyle L. Cochran, Santa Rosa, CA

The U.S. does anything the Israel lobby in the U.S. wants it to do. The reasons are 100 percent domestic politics.

 

Hats Off to Ralph Nader

I read with great interest Richard Curtiss' article in the June 2000 issue of WRMEA ("The Case for a Muslim- and Arab-American Bloc Vote in 2000"). The writer discussed two candidates, Gore and Bush, but he neglected to mention a third: Ralph Nader. I actually think backing Mr. Nader to be the wisest choice for those interested in the Middle East.

Thanks in great part to your magazine, I have become aware of the Israel Lobby's domination of our electoral process. Being sympathetic to the Palestinian cause, one would think the logical move would be to support an Arab-American lobby. But I do not throw my support behind any lobby, because I think lobbies, the way they operate now, destroy the democratic process. They use large amounts of money to get their favorite candidate elected. Money talks, rather than the individual's vote.

I am familiar with Ralph Nader's position on the issue of lobbies, and I think he is the best candidate to back, for those of us interested in a truly just Middle East peace. I think the best thing for both the United States and the Middle East is the elimination of lobbies in the U.S. I am not against organizations that try to educate voters and get out the vote; but I do oppose lobbies that corrupt our democratic process by funding their favorite candidate. We claim to have democracy in the U.S., but what we really have is money-ocracy.

Ralph Nader's Green Party gets my vote this November.

Judy Keller, via e-mail

 

Too Many Sad Endings

You keep me so "fired up" that I have become depressed about the situation in Palestine/Israel. It is enough to break one's heart. Lately I find myself avoiding these stories--I already know their all-too-familiar sad endings. People made homeless, brutalized, etc. There seems to be little will on the part of Israel to cease this outrageous insanity.

You need to give more negatives (there are many) on Middle Eastern countries for more balanced reporting. This is not to say I prefer negatives but I want to get a more complete picture (Tunisia and Jordan come to mind).

Patricia Ziegher, Westford, ME

When you know all the stories yourself, it's time to start working hard at finding younger, idealistic people who don't.

 

Do People Want to Know?

I find you are the only source of information for activities in Palestine. All of the media in America are so slanted toward Israel, and most Americans have no idea what the true facts are. Most people have never heard of the USS Liberty . I have written to my senator with no response. I have lent my books out but, really, most people are only concerned with their personal lives, money, entertainment, etc.

Ken Derlingeer, Omaha, NE

You have to get people when they're ready. But the important thing is that, when people are ready, our readers find them and introduce them. Last month we turned a Turkish restaurant owner who had never heard of the magazine into a subscriber. Earlier we turned a clockmaker--lots of them are Iranian, in case you hadn't noticed--into a subscriber. Get all your clocks fixed, each one at a different establishment!

 

Some News Only in WRMEA

The real story of our unbalanced support of Israel and the cruelty of Israel toward the Palestinians can only be found in the Washington Report. Keep up the good work.

W. N. Ahrens, Honolulu, HI

 

Too "Balanced"

You're too balanced on things I find outrageous such as the genocide of Iraqi children by the U.N. Security Council's insistence on economic sanctions on Iraq. Write more about the situation of the Iraqi people and the Palestinians. I wish I could support you more, but I live on a rather limited income.

Mrs. Homer Jack, Swarthmore, PA

 

Well-Honed Thinking

I agree with you on your reporting on the Arab Middle East and Israel--the area I'm most informed about. I particularly applaud the analysis of executive editor Richard Curtiss and the penetrating special reports by publisher Andrew Killgore. With regard to the other areas you cover, you are continually expanding my knowledge. All the reports that "tell it like it is" satisfy me. My enclosed check will be a donation.

The Washington Report, as well as scholarly books and reports on the Middle East, have kept my thinking well-honed on political and social issues of the area. I speak from both personal and professional experience: Raised in my youth in my native Palestine (Jerusalem was my home town), I witnessed Britain, the mandatory power, practice the politics of "Divide and Rule." It denied with force of arms the overwhelming native Arab majority the right to self-determination, while it helped an immigrant Zionist Jewish minority arm itself and lay the foundations of and act as "a state within a state." I earned a B.A. at the American University in Cairo, Egypt, and traveled with my family to Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. In the U.S. I obtained an M.A. in journalism and a Ph.D. in political science, specializing in--and later teaching at the university level--the politics of the Middle East and the politics of strategic access to and through the area.

Name withheld, Houston, TX

 

Thanks for Library Help

This is to express our profound thanks and appreciation to you for providing our library with copies of your valuable periodicals. The information contained therein is not only immensely useful to us as well as to those who frequent our library but also help us update our database.

We wish you continued success and look forward to this sort of cooperation in the future as well.

Khalifa Ali al Yahyaei, Director of Information Center, Ruwi, The Sultanate of Oman

 

Opposed to Unlimited Immigration

In the June 2000 "Congress Watch" by Shirl McArthur, under the title, "Smear Campaign Against Sen. Spencer Abraham Intensifies," there is considerable criticism of the FAIR organization (Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting). This group is concerned with limiting the nearly unlimited hordes of immigrants that flood into this country almost without restriction. The fact that FAIR seeks to criticize Senator Abraham indicates that he supports a continuation of unrestricted immigration.

I am utterly opposed to this. We have held our door open for entirely too long and we now pay for our indiscretion. Business favors this operation, since by using immigrants they are able to reduce wages paid to programmers and other technical personnel. In fact, there are many qualified native individuals who are able to meet their every requirement, but businesses control our Congress for Sale, including its every activity.

Maybe the citizens can regain control.

W.R. Smith, Jr., Sunnyvale, CA (a long-time subscriber)

 

B'Tselem Action Alert

I would like to alert your readers to a proposed Israeli law that would allow government-sanctioned hostage taking. The government has proposed a law entitled "Imprisonment of Combatants Who are Not Entitled to Prisoner-of-War Status."

The purpose of the proposed law is to allow Israel to continue to hold Sheikh Obeid and Mustafa Dirani as hostages, although the Supreme Court recently prohibited such action. The Knesset is likely to grant the proposed law rapid passage.

Both the purpose of the proposed law and the manner in which it seeks to attain that purpose are unacceptable. The law would create a status that does not exist in international law, and essentially allow the holding of hostages for an unlimited period of time. These kinds of methods are characteristic of a terrorist organization and not a democratic state.

The proposed law establishes sweeping definitions and grants broad powers to the military, contrary to principles fundamental both to democracy and to international law. Enactment of the proposed law will also set a disgraceful international precedent.

I urge you to address your concerns to MK Prof. Amnon Rubenstein, Chair of the Constitution, Law and Justice Committee of the Knesset (fax, 972-2-675 3199) and MK Avraham Burg, Speaker of the Knesset (fax 972-2-675 4193).

Joscha Lamers and Eitan Felner, B'Tselem--the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, Jerusalem, Palestine/Israel, < This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it >

 

Keep Me Anonymous

I find you very stimulating and you help to keep me informed. I'm already in agreement with you on nearly every article I read in the Washington Report. I am already upset about the bias I see in the media and U.S. institutions against Arabs, Iranians and Muslims and Middle Easterners in general (except the Israelis, of course).

My job at the State Department will not allow me to take a public stance on this, but I appreciate getting information from you that I can't find in the mainstream press. For now I must remain anonymous.

Anonymous, Northern Virginia

 

The Loan Guarantee

I am curious to know the status of the $10 billion in loan guarantees that former President George Bush made to Israel.

Arch Miller, Berkeley, CA

 

Looking For a Political "Home"

It is obvious that Arab-Americans and Muslim-Americans are looking for a political "home." The two major parties do not have their interests at heart. The Libertarian Party, at 2600 Virginia Ave., NW, Suite 100, Washington, DC is the only political party that advocates freedom and justice for all people. It is time for all Americans to return to the principles of liberty that the founding fathers advocated.

John Kenneth Gilbreath, Chattanooga, TN

 

Dingell's Comments About Lebanon

In your May 2000 issue, p. 81, under the heading "Israel Bombing Lebanon Prompts Strong Letters" you reported that Rep. John Dingell (D-MI), in protest to Israel's February bombing of civilian targets in Lebanon, wrote a letter to President Bill Clinton on Feb. 16th which you considered to be the strongest among other letters. The Washington Report reported that Rep. John Dingell was "'both alarmed and outraged' and accused Israel of 'seriously jeopardizing the prospects of negotiating a peace agreement between Israel and Syria.'" You added that he acknowledged Israel's right to retaliate against Hezbollah guerrillas.

We kindly call to the attention of Representative Dingell that had it not been for Hezbollah, which fought all those years, that is since 1982, south Lebanon would not have been liberated from Israeli occupation in May 2000, and the bombardment of Lebanese civilians, civilian establishments such as power stations, roads, bridges, schools, homes, etc., would not have stopped.

Sirs, though the undersigned is a Christian Lebanese Arab, I and millions of other Arabs of all faiths look at Hezbollah as a freedom fighter group and not as the Zionists would like to call them, terrorists.

After the liberation of France from Nazi occupation about 10,000 collaborators with the Nazi occupation were executed without trial. None of the some 1,300 collaborators with the Israeli occupation (members of the South Lebanon Army) who surrendered to Hezbollah and other parties were harmed. The SLA was established and supported by the Israeli occupation.

SLA served the occupier and fought against their own homeland and their compatriots. SLA bombarded Lebanese territories and persecuted, tortured and killed many, many Lebanese, the thing that Representative Dingell is strongly complaining against. When Israel suddenly evacuated south Lebanon it did not advise its ally, the SLA. It just abandoned the SLA to its fate. Hezbollah simply handed SLA soldiers to the Lebanese army and the Lebanese law.

We refer Representative Dingell to what happened in south Lebanon during the last 10 days of May, which was shown on TV all over the world, and the humanitarian and civilized reaction of Hezbollah when its fighters entered the liberated south Lebanon.

We appreciated Representative Dingell's concern about the safety of Lebanese civilians and establishments.

Adib S. Kawar, Beirut, Lebanon

 

Newspaper Stifles News Negative to Israel

I offer the following letter published in the Austin American-Statesman on June 11, 2000 for your "Other People's Mail" section. This letter was edited a bit before publishing, but the main thrust remains. Incidentally, this Cox Enterprises newspaper has allowed very, very few letters criticizing or alluding negatively to Israel for about 10 years.

Best wishes to you and the staff of the Washington Report for creating one of the very few sources of truth about the Middle East in our great "democratic" country.

William V. Kelly, Austin, TX

We've put your letter to the Austin American-Statesman in the queue for "Other People's Mail.

 

Your Bias Shows

Your bias (I share it) shows a little too clearly for a publication that seeks widespread national credibility.

I once steered a fairly successful organization in San Antonio but it gradually became a pet of the Arabs, anathema to the Jews, and a trivial curiosity to others, after which it just disintegrated. Be sure to keep the "American" vividly out front.

Anonymous, Pennsylvania

 

We Value You Greatly

My wife and I value you greatly. We hope you can continue your work. We feel compassion toward the Palestinians and those Israelis who are working for a just settlement of the problems and continuing dramas in the Middle East. One feels anger about Israel's slow-motion ethnic cleansing of Palestinians and the land-grabbing that goes on.

When it's possible, please print the news of the U.S. government (Congress, the White House, State Department) actions concerning the Middle East (e.g. movement toward relocating the Embassy to Jerusalem, on Palestinian land). Please publicize the change in lands now occupied and controlled by Israel over the century 1900 to 2000 (i.e., from majority of Palestinian Christians and Muslims to the majority ofJewish secularists).

A.E. Castello, Berkeley, CA

 

Write More About Two-Faced Policy

You're not giving us enough of both sides of the story on Turkey/Azerbaijan setting up Armenia for strangulation (half of its population has left). Also tell us more about the Arab countries bordering Israel (95 percent of whose Jewish population have no biblical roots).

How about an illustrative article on the two-faced U.S. policy. That is, Russians are bad to go into Chechnya but it's just dandy for Turkey to invade Cyprus, attack within Iraq, kill Kurds or relocate them, simply because the Turks are allies of Israel and can extend U.S. oil barons' interests into Azerbaijan (which didn't exist 100 years ago--they were called Tatars) and Kazakhstan. Kindly write about the 10 percent of Armenia that remains.

K.D. Sahagian, Englewood, FL

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