Israel-Palestine Issues

Obama comes out and says a peace between the two must involve Israel returning to its pre-1967 borders. PM Netanyahu meets with Obama and in the ending part shown on TV, he seems to lecture Obama, as Obama sits stone-faced staring at him. I thought it was an extraordinarily clear and precise explanation of the problems the old borders posed for Israel. However, others say he was being rude to the president by appearing to lecture him.

I say, if your ideas are so simple-minded as to be of first-grade caliber, then you deserve to be lectured like a first-grader. Netanyahu clearly explained why Israel can never go back to the pre-1967 borders, because at one point the country would be only 9 miles wide! I looked on a map and see what he was talking about. These borders would clearly be indefensible, as Netanyahu states.

It should be noted that giving back the West Bank is a wholly different proposition than giving back the Sinai. If you look at a map the difference is obvious. Giving up the Sinai did not compromise Israel's borders; in fact, it in essence gave Israel a nice buffer zone between itself and Egypt proper. However, having an indefensible border with Palestine would be unthinkable. It is the Palestinaians who refused to accept the partition in 1948 and vowed to "drive the Jews into the sea". Their actions since then have been in keeping with this solemn vow they made years ago.

Some may argue that it is not proper to assess "collective responsibility" to the Palestinians, a phrase I first heard from a Bethel professor years ago. After giving this considerable thought, I say it *is* proper to assign such responsibility. After all, these people revere the suicide bombers as martyrs, take care of their families, and put their pictures up in the town square as heroes. Their twisted concept of "family honor" requires that each family have a "martyr" in the family to maintain the family honor. It is sick, sick, sick, and those who ignore this do so at their peril.

And don't even get me started on this idiotic "right of return" the Palestinians keep whining about. Most people are sensible and mature enough to go with life instead of living in the past, as Mennonites have done over the centuries when driven from one land to another. And, come to think of it, as the Jews themselves have had to do over the years. Get over it and get a life already!