The four hostile responses to my Op-ed, the Gaza Holocaust, including one written by Karen Cohen of the Endowment for Middle East Truth (party to the production and distribution of the DVD, "Obsession" all said my source was Arab propaganda. In my 750-word letter, admittedly too long, and perhaps not terribly interesting, you might find useful links and references and hopefully a surprise or two:
About My Letter to the Editor
Betty Molchany
http://wcrnews. wordpress. com/ pages 7-8 printed below
I write in response to the letter from Karen Cohen of the Endowment for Middle East Truth.
Regarding my Jan. Op-ed, "The Gaza Holocaust," Ms. Cohen wrote that it is based upon Arab propaganda. Were my references to B’tselem, the Jerusalem Post, Ha’aretz, Jewish Voices for Peace, Gush Shalom, Amy Goodman (Democracy Now), and Breaking the Silence (Israeli soldiers) Arabs posing as Jews?
Many thousands of Jews in Israel and all over the world have been and are protesting Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians. Israel’s last remaining Holocaust survivors have condemned Israel’s attack on Gaza: "The Warsaw Ghetto is right in front of you, targeted by your own tanks and artillery, and its name is Gaza.... for you, the leaders of Israel, ‘freedom’ is a dirty word." http://tinyurl. com/IHS-notourna me
Henry Siegman, former head of the American Jewish Congress, wrote "Israel’s Lies" about Hamas and Gaza and its reasons for its attack. http://tinyurl. com/Siegman- IL Israeli historian Avi Shlaim, "The Iron Wall," wrote to the Guardian (UK) that "If all Israel wanted was to stop rocket attacks from Gaza, all it had to do was to observe the ceasefire... ." A joint study by Tel Aviv University and a European University revealed that Israel causes 79 percent of ceasefire breaches. http://tinyurl. com/reignite- vio
Israeli historian Ilan Pappe, author of "Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine," wrote on Jan 3 of Israeli lies in describing "the victims of Gaza as terrorists and Israel's massive killings of them as an act of self-defense." http://www.counterc urrents.org/ pappe030109. htm
Jewish-American scholar, Phyllis Bennis wrote in "The Gaza Crisis," that "Israel's claim that it is ‘responding to’ or ‘retaliating for’ Palestinian rocket attacks is spurious." http://www.globalre search.ca/ Israeli Uri Avnery has written of the many times Israel could have had peace and chose otherwise. www.gushshalom. org And Jewish Member of the British Parliament, Sir Gerald Kaufman, said "My grandmother did not die to provide cover for Israeli soldiers murdering Palestinian grandmothers in Gaza."
On April 30, 2008, Jewish Nobel Prize winner, Harold Pinter and 103 other prominent Jews wrote to the Guardian (UK) that Israel "engages in ethnic cleansing, that violates international law, that is inflicting a monstrous collective punishment on the civilian population of Gaza and that continues to deny to Palestinians their human rights and national aspirations. " http://tinyurl. com/Pinter- Israel Here are but a few more all Americans should read: Eric Margolis, Norman Solomon, Joshua Frank, Norman Finklestein, Noam Chomsky, Ben Cohen, Gordon Levy, Amira Hass, Ran HaCohen, Glenn Greenwald, Stephen Zunes, Avrum Burg.
Ms. Cohen warns me that if I don’t understand the truth about the ME, I "will be standing in line for [my] burka...." I will certainly stand out since the majority of Muslim women around the world do not wear burkas. Certain Christian and Jewish sects have clothing restrictions. As one of the founders of the Virginia Women Attorney’s Association in 1980 because women were not treated equally in Virginia, I support women’s rights. Among other things, I oppose forcing Israeli women to sit at the back of the bus. Miriam Shear, an American-Israeli riding a bus to the Western Wall was beaten by a group of ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) men for refusing to do so. Last week, Israeli Channel 10 reported about Jewish-Israeli Goel Ratzon who is living with 32 women with whom he has fathered 89 children. His children "are required to kiss his shoes, and worship the tattoo of his portrait on their mother's arm." These are legal in Israel.
Israel’s argument for its attacks on the entire population and infrastructure is that no one in Gaza is innocent, the same as implied by Cohen when she wrote "Call it the fault of Hamas....but the people of Gaza voted for their government." What she argues is a war crime, specifically "collective punishment." Hamas received 42.9 percent of the vote. But even if they had received 75 percent or greater, which they clearly did not, more than half of Gazans are under age 14 and 30+ percent voted for Fatah. If many in Gaza had not opposed Hamas, then why did Israel, the US, and Canada provide weapons and training to Fatah followers in Gaza to wage a bloody battle against Hamas?
Jennifer Lowenstein, based on her own observations in Palestine, wrote, "If Hamas Did Not Exist," Israel would still be committing its horrific treatment of the Palestinians. Israel does not want peace. Without its alleged victimhood and the many Hollywood and television movies related to the Holocaust, it might not continue to receive US billions every year.
