Working for Peace on Earth and Peace with Earth since 1952
Working for Peace on Earth and Peace with Earth since 1952
In 40 years of writing opinion pieces and letters to Connecticut newspapers I’ve never been attacked by 8, count ‘em, 8 Jewish organizations. [See below] One would think with the new outbursts of antisemitism coming from Ye and Trump and the like, they would have better things to do, but my coreligionists who have been beguiled by Zionism have frequently put Israeli state interests ahead of the interests of Jews around the world.
Here’s a fine opportunity for people to write letters and op-eds responding to the various lies in the letters below and more importantly to tell what’s happening in Palestine.
This is my original opinion piece published in Hears papers with over 200,000 circulation.
Some points
1. Lies of omissions. In my opinion piece I list fact after fact, about Shireen Abu Akleh, Omar As’ad, Fatima al-Masri, Rahaf Salman, the unrecognized villages, the denial of housing permits, etc. My critics don’t answer a single charge.
2. Israeli Arabs [that is Palestinians with an Israeli passport] are manifestly NOT full members of Israeli society and the millions of Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem who are also subjects of Israel have a far lower status.
3. The leaders of the 8 organizations think it outrageous that Israeli misconduct be compared to what a Sudanese regime did in Darfur. Well, take a look at the full record going back to 1947, ethnic cleansing, massacres, apartheid, invasions, etc. If Connecticut voters really knew they full picture they would be appalled. Connecticut should not invest in countries with terrible human rights records, period.
4. The endless “dialogue” over peace is a fraud. The Israeli state, which extends from the river to the sea, is for the benefit of Jews-only and this is established right in Israeli law.
As for the second letter
1. One can complain about one human rights abuses or invasion whether about Ukraine, Yemen or Palestine without having to mention others. As far as the organization that I represent, Promoting Enduring Peace, it has a fine record in criticizing other foreign abuses whether in Ukraine, Syria or Saudi Arabia.
2. Do let the Treasurer candidates talk about ALL foreign investments of the pension fund. There was a recent piece about $2 million invested in Saudi companies. Let’s talk about that and see if they can be justified.
3. If Palestinians stopped all resistance to Israel (and overwhelmingly it has been non-violent resistance) they would be deprived of their land completely.
(send letters, 250 word max to letters@nhregister.com or to one of the other Hearst papers. Include your phone number and address to prove you wrote the letter. It won’t be printed.)
Letter to the Editor of Hearst CT re: Recent Stanley Heller Op-Ed
To The Editor:
Stanley Heller’s opinion piece, published in newspapers across Connecticut, asks Connecticut’s Treasury candidates to reconsider our state’s investments in Israel, calling Israel an apartheid state. We believe that whoever becomes our next state Treasurer should not only continue our state’s investment in Israel but increase the ties between Israel and Connecticut.
Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East and is demonstrably not an apartheid state, as is asserted by Mr. Heller. In Israel, Arab citizens vote and sit in the Knesset (the legislative body), in government and on the Supreme Court. Israeli Arabs are full members of Israeli society and are represented across business, academia, and a variety of other industries, none of which could occur in an apartheid state.
While there is certainly room for legitimate criticism of Israeli policies, Mr. Heller’s anti-Israel diatribe is nothing short of an effort to vilify and ostracize the only Jewish nation in the world. This demonization undermines fundamental building blocks for Israeli-Palestinian understanding, peace-building and, ultimately, a two-state solution. Furthermore, his comparison between Israeli actions and the horrific genocide in Darfur is offensive and wholly unacceptable, and plays into the false and, at times, antisemitic, notion that Israel is committing genocide towards the Palestinians.
Support of Israel through investment benefits Connecticut businesses and residents. In addition to the tax benefits that Connecticut reaps from tax dollars paid by Israeli companies, both Israel and Connecticut are leaders in Financial and Agricultural Technology. Collaborations between Connecticut companies and their Israeli counterparts ultimately benefit not only our state, but our country and world as a whole. Calls for financial isolation of Israel will do the exact opposite, undermining much-needed dialogue and engagement in the process.
Signed:
ADL Connecticut Office
Jewish Federation of Greater New Haven
Jewish Federation of Greater Hartford
Jewish Federation of Greater Fairfield County
United Jewish Federation of Greater Stamford, New Canaan and Darien
UJA-JCC of Greenwich
Jewish Federation of Western Connecticut
Jewish Federation of Eastern Connecticut
Letter that was published 10/25
Opinion: Unfair to criticize only Israel (nhregister.com)
Hank Kopel
Oct. 25, 2022
Stanley Heller again calls out Israel — and only Israel — in his latest op-ed urging Connecticut’s state treasurer candidates to endorse the withdrawal of any and all state investments in Israeli companies.
Notably absent from this purported human rights advocate was any similar call for divestment from China, which for years has been carrying out a ruthless genocide of the Uygher people, over a million of whom now languish in concentration camps. Nor was there any call for the Connecticut Energy Assistance Program to bar purchases of heating oil sourced from Venezuela, a Communist human rights catastrophe that has driven over 15 percent of its population to flee their brutal regime.
No, Mr. Heller targets just Israel for divestment — the only the liberal democracy in the Middle East, the only country in the region where gays and lesbians enjoy the law’s full protection, and the only one where Jews, Christians, Muslims and others all enjoy freedom of worship.
And why? Because of a small but tragic number of incidents where Palestinian Arabs were killed or injured during incidents where Israel was forced — as it has been thousands of times in its 74-year history — to take actions in defense of its national security.
Which actions are necessitated by this brutal reality, one that critics like Mr. Heller never acknowledge: For nearly a century, since at least as far back as 1928, and without respite since then, the Palestinian leadership has ruthlessly propagandized its people to hate Jews, to hate the Jewish homeland that in 1948 became Israel, and to commit mass murders of Israelis. Thousands upon thousands of innocent Israelis have been murdered or maimed as a result.
If Mr. Heller really cared about peace between Israel and the Palestinian people, he might instead consider advocating divestment of the Palestinian Authority — which receives hundreds of millions annually from the U.S. taxpaying public, all while continuing to indoctrinate its people in genocidal Jew hatred, and all while spending millions of U.S. tax dollars on rewards and pensions for those who heed the PA’s nonstop exhortations to murder Israelis. And which Palestinian leadership has since 1948 rejected at least seven Israeli offers of Palestinian statehood as part of a two-state peace plan.
Mr. Heller’s misguided animus towards Israel also ignores this fundamental reality: If the Palestinians laid down their weapons today, tomorrow there would be peace with Israel. But if Israel laid down its weapons today, tomorrow there would be no Israel.
Hank Kopel lives in Woodbridge
An Afghan Immigrant in the US
from Seeking Home in a Strange Land: True Stories of the Changing Meaning of Home
Edited by Sietske Dijkstra, Lia Van Doorn and James Clement van Pelt
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