{"id":440049,"date":"2010-03-17T18:23:51","date_gmt":"2010-03-17T22:23:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/seattletimes.nwsource.com\/html\/northwestvoices\/2011371978_endingusaidtoisrael.html?syndication=rss"},"modified":"2010-03-17T18:23:51","modified_gmt":"2010-03-17T22:23:51","slug":"ending-u-s-aid-to-israel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/440049","title":{"rendered":"Ending U.S. aid to Israel"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ending relationship hurts U.S. as well<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thomas Friedman\u2019s column \u201cDriving drunk in Jerusalem: Israel takes U.S. for granted\u201d [Opinion, March 16] puts him at the front of the line of people pouring gasoline on a fire in an attempt to put it out.<\/p>\n

As many more astute observers have remarked on other pages, the impasse between Israel and the Palestinians has nothing to do with settlements. The Palestinians cannot abide the existence of Israel, period. If they could, we would have had peace 60 years ago, 30 years ago or today.<\/p>\n

The Obama administration, by artificially creating a new \u201cobstacle to peace\u201d that did not exist before, has handed the Palestinians another weapon in their worldwide campaign to delegitimize Israel and wipe it off the map. In this effort they have many allies and now we can add Friedman to the list.<\/p>\n

But what I object to most of all is the title of his piece. The reality is: The U.S. needs the support of Israel and until now has had no better friend in the world. Israel\u2019s existence is at stake, but in this ridiculous and unnecessary imbroglio, America has the second-most to lose.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Robert Wilkes, Bellevue<\/em><\/p>\n

White House picking a losing fight<\/strong><\/p>\n

For Thomas Friedman, it is always axiomatic that Jewish construction is bad and Arab destruction, \u2014 like the Biden-and-Clinton-inspired Arab rioting now going on in Jerusalem \u2014 is good, or at any rate \u201cjustifiable.\u201d<\/p>\n

Of course, the decision of the White House to pick a fight with Israel over its routine announcement of an intention to build some apartments for the expanding population of its own capital city has two causes \u2014 neither commendable.<\/p>\n

First is the desire to keep alive the option of an apartheid Palestine, for it is well-known that Palestinian Arabs cannot accommodate a single Jew in their projected state.<\/p>\n

The second part is to divert attention from the implications of Biden\u2019s ludicrous declaration to the Israeli public on March 11 that \u201cThe United States is determined to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, period.\u201d<\/p>\n

Anyone who believes this might be interested in some choice real estate I know about in downtown Kabul.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Edward Alexander, Seattle<\/em><\/p>\n

The straw that broke America\u2019s backing of Israel<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thank you for the powerful editorial suggesting a way to \u201cencourage\u201d Israel to become a true \u201cpartner for peace\u201d with Palestine [\u201cExpensive stalemate,\u201d Opinion, March 14]. Up to this point, the U. S. policy has been to demand that Israel stop building settlements but there have been no consequences if the construction did not cease. That demand has been totally ignored, as settlement construction continues at a greater pace.<\/p>\n

Now is the time to demand a change in Israel\u2019s policy, with negative consequences if Israel does not comply. The perfect consequence would be for the U. S. government to discontinue military aid to Israel until it stops building settlements.<\/p>\n

As Palestinians watch their homes and farmland being demolished and experience the harassment of over 500 Israeli checkpoints \u2014 which delay their passage to medical facilities, schools, employment, shopping, worship and family gatherings \u2014 they conclude that Israel has no interest in peace, but only in making peace agreements. The constant settlement expansion is the \u201cstraw that broke the camel\u2019s back.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2014 Sue Ellen Johnson, Shelton<\/em><\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ending relationship hurts U.S. as well Thomas Friedman\u2019s column \u201cDriving drunk in Jerusalem: Israel takes U.S. for granted\u201d [Opinion, March 16] puts him at the front of the line of people pouring gasoline on a fire in an attempt to put it out. As many more astute observers have remarked on other pages, the impasse […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2861,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-440049","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440049","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2861"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=440049"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440049\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=440049"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=440049"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=440049"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}