Your proposed peace plans

Submitted by Catherine Logan (Israel), Sep 9, 2003 at 14:20

Dear Mr. Pipes. I come from the other side of the political blanket, being a life-log left-wing Democrat who would have been a socialist if there had been such a viable party in the US during my youth. Or perhaps libertarian more properly explains my politics. But let me say that you have hit the nail on the head with this article. I have been in Israel now for over 17 years, and I have watched the rise and fall -- FELT the rise and fall within myself -- of hopeful horizons and despair. I have watched outsiders muddling aroud making trouble for both sides through their incredible ignorance of the region, Islam (and its many variations), Muslims, and the Israeli character. They have given hope first to one side and then to the other, and those hopes have practically destroyed any possibility of peace by giving the Palestinians the idea that they would eventually win and throw all of the Jews into the sea -- and the Israelis the hope that they would eventually shove the Palestinians eastward and abolish terrorism.

Neither dream is realistic, nor should they be, if it means that either Palestinians or Israelis have to be destroyed to make it happen. The Palestinians, by virtue of a people, should have their own place. And so should we. And all the women and children and truly loving fathers on both sides of the barbed wire deserve to live in dignity and peace, and hopefully one day down the road in mutual respect.

I think your solution is brilliant. I think, if anyone will listen to you, that it is perhaps the last idea that just might work before we have total conflagration here. I note with interest that you have just been inducted into the White House advisors clique. Good. I don't always like what you have to say, but you have a lot of common sense and an incisive mind. I hope in Washington you will be able to find attentive listeners.

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