Keys to Peace: Monitors, Pre-1967 Borders

“Tough Odds but High Stakes” (editorial, Dec. 14) was spot on. If we can’t engineer peace between Israel and the Palestinians we will lose the support of the Islamic world and the disenfranchised, unemployed Palestinians, particularly their youth, could conclude that America is their enemy.

It is unfortunate that the U.S. thwarted the U.N. Security Council resolution on this conflict without providing a positive alternative (Dec. 15). It begins to appear that because of his U.S. backing, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon may be avoiding peace. After all, his tour de force at the Al Aqsa mosque on the Temple Mount, Islam’s third most holy site, did much to start the current intifada.

Hayward Thomas

Palos Verdes Estates

Israel has had the key to peace in the Middle East for years but refuses to make the moves to bring about peace. It is simple. Get out of the occupied territories!

Palestinians recognize the state of Israel’s borders up to the 1967 war. But Israel is power- and land-hungry and wants to hold on to the illegally occupied Gaza Strip and West Bank at the expense of its own people, using the settlements as fronts for the land grab.

Israel’s policy of illegally occupying Palestinian land and then teasing the Palestinians with offers to give back bits and pieces is reminiscent of the story of the thief who steals your wallet then wants to negotiate with you to give it back.

U.N. peacekeeping forces were asked for by Yasser Arafat but Israel refused, giving Israel free rein to do what it wants without restraint. What about the security of the Palestinians from the army of Sharon?

Jane El Farra

Shadow Hills

Following a week in which the FBI thwarted [an alleged] plot by Jewish-American terrorists to blow up a mosque and the office of an Arab American congressman and Israel substantially increased its body count of innocent Arab civilians in occupied Palestine, it was ironic to read Rabbi Abraham Cooper’s article (Opinion, Dec. 16) decrying anti-Jewish stereotypes in the Third World Arab media. The good rabbi has elevated playing the victim to an art form.

Randall Bookout

Coronado

Re “Arafat: A Man Without a Vision,” by Boris Freesman, Commentary, Dec. 12: Arafat has always had a vision. Whether sending terrorists into Israel from Jordan, Lebanon or the Palestinian Authority, Arafat has always had a vision of “liberating” all of Palestine--between the river and the sea--through terror. If Freesman--and the West--didn’t understand Arafat’s vision, well, it’s their own mistake.

Nathan Wirtschafter

Valley Village