Persecution

This letter will appear in the next issue of the Spectator (London)
>
> Dear Sir:
> I subscribe to the contention of Anthony Browne (Spectator, "Church of
> Martyrs", March 26, 2005) that Christians are persecuted in much of the
> Muslim world. But, when he claims that the Christians are "threatened with
> violence and legally discriminated against because of their faith...more
> than any other religion," he is unfortunately wrong. Persecution of Jews in
> the Muslim world has continued unabated for centuries. Although Islam is a
> relatively recent religion (700 years old) compared to Judaism (5000) and
> Christianity (2000), it is far more aggressive in its belligerence towards
> what it sees as potential rivals.
> While Browne bemoans the persecution of Christian minorities in Iraq, he
> ignores the fact that there are now NO Jews in Iraq, even though Jews
> inhabited Iraq for at least 3,000 years and there were ca. 350,000 of them
> as recently as 1948. Unfortunately the Christians are being persecuted now
> since they have no strong protectors, but that has been the situation of the
> Jews since the beginning, and at least there is some protection afforded
> Christians from the Western countries, while the remaining Jews in the
> Middle East, living mostly in Israel, have to contend with growing Islamic
> violence and discrimination.
> An example of this is at the UN. Try for example to criticize a Muslim State
> for the persecution of minorities there, such as the persecution of Blacks
> in Dafour, Sudan, or of Copts in Egypt and see what happens. While there
> are 25 anti-Israel General Assembly resolutions passed each year, there were
> none on Dafour. The Christians in the Middle East are doomed to extinction
> unless a basic change towards democratization and concomitant protection of
> minorities takes place within the Muslim world.
> Sincerely
> Jack Cohen
> Netanya
> Israel
>
>
_______________________________________________________
This letter will appear on the web site of ETC. a magazine for high school students
in the UK (see the reply of the editor below:

Dear Evan:
I read your article "Two Tribes". I found it generally fair, but I write to
correct a few actual errors or omissions.
- to call the Palestine-Israel conflict "the most important issue in the
world" is facetious. By whose judgment? I regard the Kashmir situation,
where Pakistan and India both with nuclear weapons face-off over a region
far larger and more populous than Israel-Palestine, or the Taiwan-China
situation to be of greater danger! This mantra is repeated ad nauseum by
the Arab countries as a means of bringing Western pressure on Israel.
- You do not emphasize that while Israel is a stable democracy, having had
many elected governments, the Palestinians have had one dictatorship (only
the recent election of Mahmud Abbas was democratic, and until now the
Palestine Authority is not democratic).
- The UN - you failed to mention that the 22 Arab countries and their 35
Islamic allies have a routine majority at the UN, so condemnations of Israel
are assured whatever Israel does. Israel has NOT ignored UN resolutions.
General Assembly resolutions are not binding, and Security Council
resolutions on the Israel-Palestine dispute require agreement of the two
sides, not unilateral Israeli actions. The UN resolutions on Iraq and other
cases were different.
- You state "As defense minister in 1983, Sharon was found indirectly guilty
of massacre by Israeli soldiers of alleged Arab fighters in refugee camps in
Beirut." this is an error of fact, the Christian militias murdered the
Palestinians in Sabra and Shatilla, Israeli soldiers were not involved!
Sharon was found by an Israeli Govt. Committee to have been responsible for
allowing the Christian militias to enter the camp.
- It is not "a wall" it is a Security Fence that has reduced terrorist
incidents against Israeli civilians by ca. 90% - it is a passive
anti-terror weapon that works! (That's why the British Embassy in Israel
recently put up a wall around it to protect it!)
- In your summary you failed to ask "will the PA be governed by democratic
forces or remain controlled by terrorist organizations?"
Maybe more balanced next time?
Jack Cohen
Professor
Hebrew University
Jerusalem
Israel

Hi Jack

Thanks for this email. First, I'm really pleased that you found our piece 'generally fair'. You're the first of the several correspondents on this subject who's said anything of the kind: most have accused me of spreading lies and propaganda, and abused me for my deliberate and malicious bias against Israel. The one-sidedness of some of these attacks has made our initial article look like a model of neutral restraint. It seems you've seen that we've at least tried not to be deliberately dishonest, and I appreciate that.
...........................................
Please don't take my answers to your points the wrong way - I really appreciate the quiet and sane way in which you have taken issue with the feature, a quality notably absent from other emails. I do hope you understand I wasn't deliberately trying to anger people or give a one-sided view of the whole situation. I fully accept that it was far from perfect, but we did our best.
With all good wishes

Evan Jeffries

Editor, ETC magazines
www.etcmag.co.uk