Forward, NY 2001 two letters, one by Segan in response to another reader’s letter
THE FORWARD, N.Y.
Editorial - Letters
This first letter, following, published Dec. 12, 2000, was written by Robert Israel Lappin of Massachusetts. (Segan’s response letter follows, published Jan. 5, 2001)
FEIN’S ‘CARELESS MISSTATEMENTS’ ON SETTLEMENTS
by Robert Israel Lappin:
Leonard Fein has a way with words; he advances outrageous ideas so skillfully that they seem reasonable. Examples this year:
The Law of Return for Jews to Israel should be abrogated, and a law of return to Israel for Arabs should be implemented. Israelis should accept the Arab demand that Israel become
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He foresees the end of Israel as a state
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“a state of all its citizens,” and no longer exist as a Jewish state.
Non-Jews should be able to become Jews simply by declaration, without traditional conversion by rabbis.
Now, in his December 1 article, “A Mistake is a Mistake,” he writes “a significant proportion of West Bank and Gaza Palestinians wants not only to have an independent state, it wants to see an end to the Jewish state.” He further writes, “is there any example of an indigenous movement for independence” No occupying power ever has retained control in the face of a popular movement for national liberation. There is no reason whatsoever to suppose that Israel will prove to be an exception.” So Mr. Fein foresees the end of Israel as a state, and matter-of-factly turns history and the Palestinians upside-down by declaring the Palestinians a people indigenous to Israel and, in effect, the Jews an occupying power. Little does he care that the Palestinians completely lack the credentials as an indigenous people; they did not exist as a people until the rebirth of Israel. They are a historical fiction, without contribution to society’s human endeavors. They are identified as a people only by their terrorism and hatred for Jews. As it is stated in the Palestinian National Covenant, they are sons of the large Arab nation.
How can Mr. Fein write such trash, and continue to be published – even with his way with words?
Robert Israel Lappin
Swampscott, Mass.
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THE FORWARD, N.Y.
January 5, 2001
Letters
LETTER STEREOTYPES PALESTINIANS
“The Jews completely lack the credentials as an indigenous people; they did not exist as a people. They are a historical fiction; without contribution to society’s human endeavors. They are identified as a people by their terrorism and hatred for righteous-God fearing Christians.”
Sound like a rewrite of Commandant Amon Goeth’s words to his troops at the onset of the liquidation of the Krakow ghetto in the film “Schindler’s List” or a blurb from a Nazi or Holocaust denial website?
I substituted “Jews” for “Palestinians” and “righteous God-fearing Christians” for “Jews” in Robert Lappin’s contemptuous letter to the editor toward Leonard Fein’s article regarding Palestinians (Fein’s ‘”Careless Misstatements’ on Settlements,” December 22).
As a guest lecturer in schools, colleges, prisons and other venues where I teach the Holocaust through the universally understood media of art, my three primary goals are to help restore dignity to the memory of some individual victims of the Shoah; assist students in breaking down gross caricaturing and stereotyping of
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Annihilating their dignity as human beings.
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entire groups of people and to think about the moral and ethical choices that allowed the Shoah to occur.
Of the Palestinians, Mr. Lappin fails on all counts. Not only does he engage in a brutal stereotyping of a displaced people, he seeks to annihilate and “ethnically cleanse” their very dignity as human beings. This sort of inflammatory rhetoric serves no useful purpose but to fan the flames of violence. That’s hardly productive for today’s students.
Akiva K. Segan
Director, Holocaust Education Through Art
Seattle, Wash.