|
Pulse of the Twin Cities Login |
|
If you do not have an account yet
Create One.
|
|
|
Twin Town High (vol. 8) |
|
|
|
|
Letters 02-07-07
Wednesday 07 February @ 15:14:25 |
 Response to Polly Mann
I read the commentary in your Jan. 24 issue by Polly Mann (“Jimmy Carter [and others] face criticism for airing plight of the Palestinians”) but the logic of her argument escapes me.
Simon and Schuster, one of the country’s best-respected publishing houses, has made former President Carter’s book, “Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid” available to the world. But things are apparently rough for the president: According to your Mideast Corresponding Editor, he’s been “penalized” for speaking his mind.
So, what was his penalty? When he toured the country giving book signings—which he has publicly acknowledged were very successful—was that his penalty? When he appeared on major interview programs on nationally broadcast television—like the “Charlie Rose” show, and promoted his book—was that his penalty? No, his penalty came when 14 members of the Carter Center’s advisory board resigned. This is an outrage! How dare these board members have the audacity to think they also have the “inherent right of U.S. citizens to freedom of expression”?
It is not ridiculous to challenge President Carter’s use of a book title that implies that Palestinians are living under apartheid. When Travis Smiley, who is African-American, interviewed Carter on his nationally broadcast television program and suggested that the comparison to apartheid unfairly diminishes the suffering of Black South Africans under that segregationist, racist government, he was not penalizing Carter. He was expressing a legitimate, thoughtful challenge to the book’s author. That is called a public discourse of ideas. After President Carter replied breezily that Black South Africans living under apartheid were better off than Palestinians living in the territory occupied by Israel, Smiley paused, picked his jaw up off the floor, then continued his interview.
It does not penalize President Carter to challenge his use of source materials in the book. Dennis Ross, envoy to the Middle East during the Clinton Administration, helped formulate the Clinton plan at Camp David that would have created a state of Palestine in 100 percent of Gaza and 97 percent of the West Bank, with its capitol in the Arab portion of Jerusalem. Dennis Ross wrote in the New York Times that “[T]o my mind, Mr. Carter’s presentation badly misrepresents the Middle East proposals advanced by President Bill Clinton in 2000, and in so doing undermines, in a small but important way, efforts to bring peace to the region.” He noted that in the book President Carter used maps he created without getting permission and labeled a map “Palestinian Interpretation of Clinton’s Proposal 2000” which “is actually taken from an Israeli map presented during the Camp David meeting…” and concludes that “peace can never be built on these myths.”
President Carter’s book is being debated in the public sphere and that is not a bad thing. The last time I checked, that was called freedom of expression and I consider that to be a good thing. Here in Minnesota, the American Jewish World ran two opposing opinion pieces about his book on the same page of the newspaper; one in support of it by Rabbi Michael Lerner and one against it by Eran Lerman. Rabbi Lerner is the editor of Tikkun, a nationally distributed magazine that advocates Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation, and Eran Lerman is director of the American Jewish Committee’s Israel and Middle East Office. This kind of open debate does not penalize President Carter—it simply shines the light of intellectual discourse on his work.
Are the Palestinian people suffering? Yes. Do I think they deserve to live in peace and security in their own state? Yes. Are the Israeli people suffering? Yes. Do I think they deserve to live in peace and security in their own state? Yes. Was I dismayed and disappointed to see President Carter—a man I admire and am deeply grateful to for negotiating the peace agreement between Israel and Egypt—equate the Palestinian’s plight with apartheid? Yes. Does my reaction or the writing of these words unfairly penalize him or Polly Mann or limit freedom of speech? No.
Howard Oransky
St. Paul
Protection from whom?
Critics argue that any troop increase would merely put off the day when the Iraqis need to assume responsibility for “their own security.” Their own security? So somebody is responsible for the “security” of the Iraqi people right now?
Well, whoever is responsible for “their security” at this present time, they are really doing a crappy job. Nothing against the troops, but an occupying force that is still launching major military offensives and spreading terror cannot and is not providing security—it’s not possible. It is the U.S. government and its media who are at fault for claiming that U.S. troops are providing security. I’m pretty sure the Iraqis can duplicate and surpass America’s “security” efforts in Iraq.
If the U.S. military is protecting and giving security to the Iraqi people, why would they want us out of Iraq? Once the U.S. leaves, Iraqis will need security from what? Themselves? We attacked them, remember? And now we provide security as we continue to attack them?
What a bizarre “war” this is, claiming to provide security for the people we are attacking.
Frank Erickson
Minneapolis
|
|
 |
|
|
Comments -
Post Comment |
|
The comments are owned by the poster. We are not responsible for its content.
NO comments yet! Be the first!
|
|
|
