(letter sent via congress.org)
Dear President Obama,"In an unfortunately predictable manner, yet another congressional hearing held on 5 February 2013 entertained biased, misleading, and inaccurate statements about what is happening in Palestine. The hearing was titled “The Fatah-Hamas Reconciliation: Threatening Peace Prospects,” and yet no Palestinian representatives were invited." Palestine's Amb. Maen Rashid Areikat: Bias against Palestinians on display at congressional hearing
http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/foreign-policy/281529-bias-against-palestinians-on-display-at-hearing
Peace and Palestine need to be taken seriously by American leadership now more than ever.
Roger Cohen, writing in the New York Times, in an op-ed aptly titled THE INVISIBILITY OF PALESTINIANS states: "That, increasingly, is the status of Palestinians to Israelis: invisibility. It is not the separation barrier snaking over the hills that has ensured this, although it has played its part. It is not the exhaustion, two decades after Oslo, of dreams of peace, although that too plays a part. It is, I think, the accumulation of 45 years of ruling over Palestinians in the occupied territories that has led to the Israeli conclusion that this is an inevitable state of affairs and that whatever discomfort this oppression causes is best ignored through selective blindness."
Ziad Asali of the American Task Force on Palestine, a tireless advocate for peace and Palestine (and American interests), recently pointed out that "The Palestinian issue can no longer be isolated, nor can the region be stabilized or move forward without progress on resolving it. This past year witnessed many setbacks and frustrations. Negotiations are at an impasse. Palestinians, Israelis and Americans are drifting further apart at a time when they need to move closer together to bring this conflict to an end. The Palestinian institution-building program, which has been giving Palestinians the security and effective, accountable governance that they deserve, is being threatened by a lack of funds." http://anniesnewletters.blogspot.com/2012/12/there-is-growing-triumphalism-from.html
Hussein Ibish ( a Senior Fellow at the American Task Force on Palestine ) warned a while ago that "The alternative to an agenda of negotiations is crystal clear: increasing conflict, violence and occupation that is increasingly dominated by religious fanatics on both sides. The religious right is well-positioned in both societies, ready to lead a battle to the death between bearded fanatics over holy places and the will of God." http://www.juancole.com/2009/11/ibish-against-one-state-solution.html
Religious tyranny is on the rise in the Middle East, with Israel- in one way or another- at the epicenter of a dangerous tendency to replace the quest for fair and just laws and true democracy with sectarian strife.
America can and should do a better job of noticing the very real plight of the Palestinians- and the vital importance of honoring our own ideals... specifically the goal of "promoting freedom of religion and conscience throughout the world as a fundamental human right and as a source of stability for all countries" The Office of International Religious Freedom ( http://www.state.gov/j/drl/irf/)
Please do all that you can to help empower a fair and just negotiated end to the Israel-Palestine conflict. A fully secular two state solution would go a long way towards calming down the entire region.
Sincerely,
Anne Selden Annab
American homemaker & poet
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