The turmoil in Gaza

Re “Weep for Gaza,” editorial, June 18

Yes, we should weep for Gaza, but not with crocodile tears. We could have wept for Gaza under the settler occupation, and when Hamas was first promoted by Israel as a counter to the Palestinian Liberation Organization, and when Gaza’s inhabitants were confined behind fences, and when its infrastructure was devastated by bombs, and when the West cut off almost all aid, pushing Gaza’s impoverished population into ever greater misery. But far more useful than weeping would have been helping. We really didn’t help, and for that we should now weep.

Will we now have two Palestinian states, the derisively named “Hamastan” in Gaza and “Bantustan” in the West Bank? Israel and the West are trying to do that, just when it seemed that the situation couldn’t get any worse.

RAYMOND HANSEN

Los Angeles

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Hamas fairly won a majority in the Palestinian parliament. Doesn’t that mean anything to the U.S., whose gun-barrel experiment in Iraqi democracy unfolds as a complete failure? Now the wagons of European, Christian-correct democracy are circled in the West Bank, the last outpost in the Middle East that might be coaxed toward a love-in with Israel. Apparently any democratically elected government that is not pro-Israel is a terrorist regime. I weep for America.

TOM LAURIE

Morro Bay

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The current political turmoil in the West Bank and Gaza is ominous, and a “West Bank first” policy is not viable in the short and long term. I am also not in favor of Israel taking over Gaza -- if Israel cannot help build, let it not destroy the situation further. What we need is a coalition of Arab countries sending peacekeeping forces to Gaza, in particular Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. Letting sectarian strife reign in Gaza would be a tragedy for all Palestinians.

The U.S. and Israel must not wipe their hands of Gaza and let it turn into another Iraq.

RIMA MUTREJA

Foster City, Calif.