Readers React: Rationalizing Israeli injustice against Palestinians

To the editor: Yossi Klein Halevi acknowledges that “Israel’s long-term survival depends on ending the occupation” and that “the Jews didn’t come home to deny another people its sense of home.” (“How do Israelis cope?,” Op-Ed, Sept. 12)

Indeed, Halevi’s self-righteous reflections on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, with Israel portrayed as the innocent, well-intentioned victim besieged by pathological Palestinian jihadists, serves as a rationalization for the apartheid-like policies of the Israeli government.

Apparently, Israel has no choice but to continue to occupy the West Bank, blockade the Gaza Strip and deny the right of return to the thousands of dispossessed Palestinians whose lands have been expropriated by the illegal settlers’ movement currently endorsed by the Israeli government.

While Halevi agonizes over an inconvenient sense of discomfort at the prospect of Palestinian statehood, he finds no cause to despair over the Israeli military’s well-documented human rights violations in the occupied territories and no reason to question Israel’s oppressive imperialist policies in those territories.

Andrew Spathis, Los Angeles

Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion