War and peace in the Middle East

Re “Israel’s lost 40 years,” Opinion, June 5

Gaining the West Bank and the Golan Heights and unifying Jerusalem in 1967 gave Israel strategic depth. Israel returned the Sinai in exchange for peace with Egypt in 1979 and Gaza without an agreement in 2005. It has made peace with Jordan and engaged in the defunct Camp David peace process in 2000. While Israeli leaders were always in favor of returning disputed territories in exchange for peace, Israel has faced obstructionist, “three no’s” strategies of Arab states, which seem to be inspired by the naqba (or catastrophe) of Israel’s creation in 1948, or the “occupation” brought on by Israel’s victories in 1967, rather than acting as a true partner for peace.

A two-state solution is the only realistic path to resolving long-held enmities. I pray that Israel’s enemies will see the light and negotiate in good faith with Israel -- “all or nothing” has clearly gotten them nowhere for 59 years.

STEVE LIPMAN

Foster City

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Meir Shalev writes that after the 1967 war, he said that Israel had “bit off something that will choke us,” and now he writes that “Israel has indeed choked” -- paid a price for what he calls, parroting Arab propaganda, “the occupation.” What Shalev seems to forget is that the war was a continuation of the war Arab states had waged since Israel’s birth 19 years earlier and were about to finish. Applying inverted leftist thinking, Shalev finds Israel’s self-defense against Arab aggression the cause of that aggression. He finds causation for war in Israeli settlements that barely existed until years after the war. And he forgets that Israeli offers of land for peace after the war were answered by the Arabs with three no’s -- no peace, no recognition, no negotiations with Israel. Shalev might consider the price Israel would have paid had it not “bit off” its enemies’ plans for its annihilation.

STEVEN ZAK

Sunland

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Thank you for your in-depth coverage of the Six-Day War. Let us not forget that before the war, Arab governments constantly declared they would eliminate Israel. Forty years later, these threats continue by oil-fueled, fundamentalist-inspired Arab and Persian governments. Why don’t we hear more about Jewish refugees from Arab and Persian countries? Wasn’t the Six-Day War justified, preemptive action?

BILL KENNEDY KEDEM

San Francisco