Arafat Has Failed to Act for Peace

Re “Arafat’s Bind: Choosing Frying Pan or the Fire,” news analysis, Aug. 12: Mary Curtius analyzes Yasser Arafat’s “bind” as fighting Israel or fighting a civil war. However, Arafat has repeatedly failed to choose a third option. He has been involved in a peace process that led to the Palestinians’ civil control of their major population centers and could lead to his people having their own state, but he is unable to forswear violence, hatred and terrorist murder. He is unable to publicly acknowledge the historical connection of the Jewish people to Jerusalem, and he is unable to tell his people that refugees are resettled; they don’t return to homes that don’t exist.

However, this man, who has ordered the murder of athletes at the Olympics and of women and children in airports and at cafes, has again turned to violence against a democratic nation. He has kept his people poor and focused on hatred while he [allegedly] has billions in Swiss bank accounts and travels around the world making visits to prime ministers and presidents.

I hope this conflict leads to the emergence of a new generation of Palestinian leaders who can stop hating long enough to consider peace as an option.

David Schechter

Los Angeles

So, “the Palestinian public” is pressuring Arafat to “fight until statehood is achieved.” But Arafat squandered just such an opportunity at Camp David. Where, then, was the outcry of the Palestinian public against the historic failure of their leader? Where were the calls for Arafat to step aside in favor of another who could finally ensure peace and stability for the Palestinian people? Indeed, the only result has been a further radicalization of the Palestinian man on the street, culminating in the atrocities at Tekoa, the Dolphinarium and in the heart of Jerusalem. Tragically, we can only conclude that it is not statehood alone that the Palestinian public desires, but along with it the complete destruction of Israel.

E. Scott Menter

Tustin

Re “Denying Evil: a Sign of Iron in One’s Soul,” Commentary, Aug. 10: However much Jews like Avi Davis may protest Palestinian violence and, indeed, however much any decent person is disgusted by it, world opinion will continue to condemn the illegal Jewish occupation of the West Bank and the confiscation of Arab homes.

The Israeli strategy appears to be to provoke so much Arab violence that world opinion will eventually concede to the Israelis what they want, all of Israel. Ultimately, it is to be hoped that the decent American taxpayer will refuse to support Israel in this quest, financially and militarily.

Mike Strong

Corona del Mar

The Israeli war machine, financed unsupervised by our tax dollars, is responsible for many more children’s deaths and “heartbreak for dozens of families” than the pathetic, hopeless and systematically persecuted Palestinian suicide bombers. Israel’s leader (elected) is the accused mass murderer and war criminal. Not Arafat.

Peter R. Burke

Arcadia

Arafat is completely disingenuous when he claims to want a truce. After the Dolphinarium bombing that killed 21 people, he verbally agreed to the Israeli cease-fire, yet his people kept attacking Israelis and he didn’t arrest those carrying out these attacks. As Davis points out, there is evidence he was planning this next wave of violence even at Camp David, where the Palestinian Authority insisted on Israel taking in 3 million Palestinian immigrants and its apologists dismissed the Israeli offers of a 95% pullback and Israeli land as “not serious.”

Richard Solomon

Los Angeles

The Bush administration calls on Arafat, the man who incites his people to destroy the “Zionist enemy” by blowing up children, students and senior citizens, to “act now to arrest and bring to justice those responsible” for terrorist acts (Aug. 10). How perverse and ironic!

Lynn Rohatiner

Los Angeles