Please send a copy (or modified version) of the following letter from VIPAC to the president, vice president, and other government officials at:
president@whitehouse.gov
vice.president@whitehouse.gov
White House
phone: 202-456-1111 Fax: 202-456-2461|
Senate and House switchboard: 202-224-3121
Click on "Govt. Email Addresses" at
www.vipac.org
for other officials
Use a subject line such as:
Israel is NOT
the problem
Israelis have rights too
Respect human rights of all
Palestinians must respect
human
rights
Palestinian "leadership" violate rights of
all
It's not
about Israel
Etc.......
Sample Letter:
Dear Mr. President:
Our view of the Arab war against Israel is being distracted by the prospect of democratic elections in the Arab sections of the Gaza, Judea and Samaria. The hope for Palestinian Arab progress toward democracy has obstructed our view of what is really happening there today.
Last week five Israeli soldiers were murdered at a border crossing. This week two Israeli cars were attacked in Gaza wounding six Israelis and mortar attack killed a Thai worker.
Is this the natural upheaval that results from the friction of a changing society? If the violence was aimed at fellow Palestinian Arabs this might be an expected course of events. However, the violence is directed at Jews and Israelis who are not part of the “Arab” democratic process. The violence is aimed at Israel by groups who have no interest in democracy and no interest in making peace with Israel. These Arabs are using the prospect of democratic elections as a cover for attacks against Israel.
In a speech given before the Board of Directors a of an international company in April 2004, Haim Harari, the former president of the Weitzman Institute of Science, stated clearly that the Israel is not the central issue of Arab unrest. “Why do I put aside Israel and its own immediate neighborhood? Because Israel and any problems related to it, in spite of what you might read or hear in the world media, is not the central issue, and has never been the central issue in the upheaval in the region. Yes, there is a 100 year-old Israeli-Arab conflict, but it is not where the main show is. The millions who died in the Iran-Iraq war had nothing to do with Israel. The mass murder happening right now in Sudan, where the Arab Moslem regime is massacring its black Christian citizens, has nothing to do with Israel. The frequent reports from Algeria about the murders of hundreds of civilians in one village or another by other Algerians have nothing to do with Israel. Saddam Hussein did not invade Kuwait, endangered Saudi Arabia and butchered his own people because of Israel. Egypt did not use poison gas against Yemen in the 60's because of Israel. Assad the Father did not kill tens of thousands of his own citizens in one week in El Hamma in Syria because of Israel. The Taliban control of Afghanistan and the civil war there had nothing to do with Israel. The Libyan blowing up of the Pan-Am flight had nothing to do with Israel, and I could go on and on and on.”
Hundreds of thousands of Arabs are resisting democracy today in Iraq, in Saudi Arabia and in Gaza, Samaria and Judea. The first step in democracy is respecting the rights of others to live in peace and security. Can “Westerners” feel safe in Saudi Arabia? Can Christians feel safe in Sudan? Can Jews feel safe in Israel, Judea, Samaria and Gaza?
The right of Jews to live in peace and security in Gaza and Judea and Samaria, even among Arabs, is a basic principle of democratic enterprise. To talk of the expulsion of Jews and Israelis from an Arab democratic state is hypocritical. In line with the philosophy of the late Israeli statesman, Menachem Begin, the Arabs of Gaza, Judea and Samaria are entitled to autonomy without violating the rights of their Jewish and Christian neighbors. Elections and democracy cannot begin until the rights of the Israelis to live in peace and security are recognized and respected by Palestinian Arabs.
I urge you to support the rights of Israelis to live in Gaza and not be disposed by yet another “peace” agreement.
Respectfully yours,