Editor’s note: This was submitted before the publication of editor-in-chief Michael J. Kleckner’s column discussing the article in question; please see “Two apologies, one good-bye, much good luck” (ODE, March 17).
After reading “Americans must end support for oppressive Israeli rule” (ODE, Mar. 12), I was appalled and angered that someone would write something that ignorant and anti-Semitic and even more angered that the Emerald thinks it is OK to print his crap. I have never felt the urge to write the Emerald with my opinion of world politics, because frankly I could care less what other people think about the war in Iraq and the Middle East, and I’m sure others feel the same way about my views. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. The one thing I will not stand is this guy comparing the Bush administration with Hitler and the Nazi Party.
As a Jew, I am deeply offended. No matter what a person’s view on Bush is, and I understand that most at the University can’t stand him, there is no comparison with Hitler — a man who ordered and carried out the murder of six million Jews, including one million children under the age of 12 in a three-year period. Many, many members of my family were slaughtered at the hands of the Nazis, and I grew up with family stories that I still have a really hard time talking about.
I refuse to let this guy trivialize the Holocaust with his views on the current administration. To me, that is the most insulting thing someone can do to a Jew. If Paul Aranas doesn’t understand that a sign with “Bush=Hitler” and a swastika is completely not appropriate, he is extremely ignorant. I know that if I had seen a person with that sign, I would definitely have done something about it.
On the matter of the Palestinians, if Aranas wants to inform us about the current situation he should at least have his facts right, but his numbers were wrong. Aranas wrote that the Palestinians are basically freedom fighters who are blowing themselves up around innocent civilians because they are “exacerbated by oppression, murder and 36 years of brutal occupation.” As if the Palestinians in charge just want peace and would stop the murders if Israel just gave them a little bit of freedom so they could live side by side in peace and harmony under a beautiful rainbow.
I looked up Hamas’ charter from their Web site. Hamas is the main terrorist organization that has sent the vast majority of suicide bombers into Israel (including the Haifa bus blast a week ago) since the late ’80s. Their mission statement reads, in part, “Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it. … The Islamic Resistance Movement believes that the land of Palestine is an Islamic Waqf consecrated for future Muslim generations until Judgment Day. It, or any part of it, should not be squandered: It, or any part of it, should not be given up. … There is no solution for the Palestinian question except through Jihad.”
It is clear that until the Palestinian terrorist organizations acknowledge Israel’s right to exist there will never be peace, and that is a fact. I feel badly that there are people as ignorant as Aranas in the world. Until he knows what he’s talking about, he should keep his mouth shut.