The following letters appear in today’s Sydney Morning Herald:
Hats off to the Independent Australian Jewish Voices for a sane and reasonable statement (“Australian Jews protest against Israel’s action“, January 6). If Israeli settlers and citizens honestly believe that their Government’s current policies will ensure the safety and prosperity of their grandchildren in 2059, then they need to be disabused of that belief.
The Israeli Government is not listening to most other governments or the United Nations. Maybe it is up to Jewish groups around the world, such as the IAJV, to speak out clearly and strongly until the message is heard.
Richard Lamb Farrer (ACT)
Russell Mills (Letters, January 6) suggests the solution in Gaza is contingent on Israel recognising the rights of a Palestinian state in exchange for rights of Israel to exist.
Is he unaware that Hamas’s opposition to the two-state solution is absolute, and that its sworn objective is nothing less than the destruction of the state of Israel? For him to suggest otherwise is either naive and misguided, or disingenuous.
The fact that civilians, including children, have been killed in Gaza is deplorable. What makes it a real tragedy is that Hamas is waging war while hiding among these people as a deliberate and cynical exercise to manufacture a humanitarian crisis. Hamas is doing this to fuel outrage and garner support in the Muslim and Western worlds, with the ultimate goal of sacrificing the only hope for the Palestinian people, progress toward a two-state solution. It is achieving this quite literally by sacrificing Palestinian civilians.
Jonathan Armstrong, North Sydney