Sent: Saturday, March 22, 2003 12:24
PM
Subject: Distortion of
facts.
March 22, 2003
The Editor,
The Halifax Herald.
Dear Editor:
In his letter, { "Missed the point" March 22}, Raymond MacDonald is
indulging in massive distortion of the facts on the ground. To accuse the
Palestinians of propaganda and terrorism is the height of audacity. The
Palestinian people, as David Doake stated, were subjected to dispossession
and ethnic cleansing 55 years ago, followed by illegal Israeli occupation for
over 35 years. They have been exposed to imprisonment with no charge or
trial, torture,extra-judicial assassination, daily humiliation, demolition of
thousands of their homes and expropriation of their property for the
creation of illegal colonies. All these acts are in violation of virtually every
article of the Fourth Geneva Convention and are in fact
war crimes, as defined by international law.
To accuse the Palestinians of terrorism is a mendacious
statement. Israel created terrorism in the Middle East, and practiced that
against Arabs, Europeans, Americans and Jews. It would take pages to detail
that, but it has been shown on the pages of this newspaper {Nov.,4,2001}. It was
summed up accurately by the late Professor Israel Shahak, a Holocaust survivor
and Chairman of Israeli League for Human and Civil Rights, who
stated :" There is nothing new in the fact that Israel is a terrorist state,
which almost from its inception has used its intelligence [from the early 1950s,
the Mossad] to assassinate people on foreign soil with any violence or
terror it considers necessary for its ends." As to the
Palestinians, international law and the UN Charter entitles all peoples
under foreign occupation, including even the Palestinian
people, to resist such occupation.
The staement by Mr. MacDonald that Israel is being subjected to undue
practice of double standards is incredible. The facts are completely the
reverse. There is no better example than the contrast with the current crisis in
Iraq. When Iraq illegally occupied Kuwait in 1990, no one entertained
negotiation with Saddam Hussein about withdrawal and a million troops were
dispatched to evict Iraq from Kuwait. Israel remains in illegal occupation of
Palestinian and Syrian territory for over 35 years, and the US is calling
for negotiation between the occupier and the occupied. When Iraq was accused of
refusing to comply with UN resolutions, econmic sanctions were applied by the US
and its allies. Israel stands today in defiance of over 70 UN resolutions and
the US provides Israel with billions of dollars and the armaments needed to
maintain its illegal occupation and oppression of the occupied people.
Devastating war is being waged today against Iraq because it is accused, by
the US and UK, of holding weapons of mass destruction [WMD] and
non-cmpliance with Security Council resolution # 687, of April 3,1991. Clause #
14 of this very resolution states that WMD should be dismantled from Iraq and
all countries in the Middle East. Israel has nuclear, chemical
and biological weapons of mass destruction, and has used chemical weapons in
1997, on the orders of prime minister Netanyahu who sent his Mossad agents,
using Canadian passports, to assassinate Khalid Meshal in
Amman, Jordan. Nothing is heard about Israeli compliance with this
resolution.
Anti-Semitism is abhorent but for Israel and its apologists to use it
to silence any criticism of Israeli policies and practices is
unacceptable.
Israel must not be allowed to remain above international
law.
Yours sincerely
Ismail Zayid,MD