Actions in the Middle East Have Long Trumped Words

Re “Days of Tea and Terrorism,” Opinion, April 20: It is misguided and a bit simplistic for Nicholas Goldberg to boil down the failure of the Mideast peace process into the line: “Although the Palestinians rejected violence ... Israel never really accepted the vote.” Whatever votes may or may not have occurred, terrorism against Israel persists. A call for violence persists in the Palestinian media, classrooms and streets. And the force of Hamas and other terror groups persists -- groups that refuse to acknowledge any such vote or mandate against violence.

Though I’m thrilled to hear that such terrorist masterminds as Leila Khaled and Abul Abbas apparently met to talk peace, the fact that they are now graying and potbellied, as Goldberg describes, does not convince me that they are ready to turn in their hateful, murderous plots for olive branches. Nor should it absolve them of their past crimes. He says that Abbas will likely be punished for his murders, no matter how “just” his cause. Which is it, Mr. Goldberg? Do Abbas and his fellow terrorist cronies reject violence? Or do they support a cause that they believe to be righteous enough to justify the use of violence and killing to achieve its goals? In this case, I think actions speak louder than the words uttered at a tea party in 1996.

Ilana Zalika

Highland Park, N.J.

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Thank you for the sincere but restrained piece by Goldberg on the failed hopes for an Israeli-Palestinian peace. His simple depiction of that split second of optimism within half a century of devastation does more to remind us of the ever-urgent need to restart the process than do all the cries of betrayal, the finger-pointing by both sides and the endless stream of conjecture by Western analysts who understand so little about the realities of the Middle East and have nothing of a personal nature at risk if they happen to be wrong.

Gina Nahai

Beverly Hills

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In “Six Killed in Israeli Raid in Gaza Strip” (April 20), mention is made of another Israeli incursion into the Rafah refugee camp at the Egyptian border, in which terrible loss of life occurred. During this raid another two tunnels were found, through which the Palestinians were smuggling arms from Egypt into the Gaza Strip. Why doesn’t anybody ask why the Egyptians (supposedly at peace with Israel) are allowing the Palestinians to import or buy arms and ammunition in their country, bring them across the sparsely settled Sinai to the border without detection, build tunnels -- one after another -- and smuggle guns into an area seething with hatred? There is no excuse, and the Egyptians would be quite able to stop this traffic if they wanted to.

Robert Snyder

Laguna Beach

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“In West Bank, a Risky Quest for Peace” (April 21) didn’t really go into detail on why there might be a good reason so many activists might want to go to the occupied territories. Could it possibly be that Israel, with U.S. financial and political support, is illegally and heinously oppressing Palestinians? The International Solidarity Movement acts as an unofficial United Nations because virtually everyone else in the world has abandoned the Palestinians. Many of us (I am Jewish and a two-time ISM participant) who have participated are neither pro-Palestinian or pro-Israeli; we are pro-justice, and we think, like the Israeli peace group Gush Shalom, that the occupation is “killing us all.”

Robert Lipton

Berkeley

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Paul Harder (letter, April 18) mentions only one side of U.N. Resolution 242. Another important component that he and others conveniently forget calls for full recognition of Israel’s right to exist, which the Palestinian leadership has yet to do. The Israeli government has shown its willingness to trade land for peace with both Egypt and Jordan. The terrorist actions of the Palestinian Authority have left Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s government little choice but to protect Israel’s very survival.

Barry Gross

Irvine