My letter to CSM RE Refugee crisis: Israelis invoke Holocaust as they debate how to respond

BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- Riham Dawabsha, the mother of 18-month-old Ali Dawabsha who was burned alive in an arson attack by Israeli extremists on July 31, died from her injuries late Sunday, after fighting for her life for over a month.... Israeli settlers smashed the windows of two homes in Duma, before throwing flammable liquids and Molotov cocktails inside, killing infant Ali, who was trapped inside the house, and critically injuring the other family members.... Israeli settlers have carried out at least 142 attacks on Palestinians in occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank since the start of this year, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs... Only 1.9 percent of complaints submitted by Palestinians against Israeli settler attacks result in a conviction, the Israeli human rights group Yesh Din reported.

RE Refugee crisis: Israelis invoke Holocaust as they debate how to respond- Israel is building a new fence along its border with Jordan amid widespread soul searching over whether it should allow Middle Eastern refugees to come in.
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2015/0911/Refugee-crisis-Israelis-invoke-Holocaust-as-they-debate-how-to-respond

Dear Editor,

Israel's obsession with demographics created and continues to perpetuate the Palestinian refugee crisis which began in 1948 with the Arab-Israel war. UN Resolution 194 from 1948 clearly outlines the expectation that those 750,000 Palestinian men women and children, those refugees “wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbours should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date..."   http://www.unrwa.org/content/resolution-194

Today more than ever, the international community- and American newspapers- need to be more honest about Israel and the huge harm that Israel's demographic obsessions have done to the region.

Israel, in violation of international law, has already built a divisive land grabbing wall on Palestinian land in the West Bank, while at the same time generously subsidizing Jewish settlements in the illegally occupied territories. Palestinians who had hoped to build a Palestinian state alongside Israel on the remnant remaining of what was historic Palestine 70 years ago do not have control of their own land, airspace or borders.

Ending the Israel-Palestine conflict ASAP with a fully secular two state solution that FULLY respects The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, would go a long way towards calming down the entire region, as well as setting a good example as to how modern nation-states based on the rule of fair and just laws are more secure, more prosperous, more sane and a much better alternative than a religious state: Tax payers here and there should not be forced to fund and empower Jewish or Islamic religious "scholars" and schemes- and endless war with escalating refugee crises.

Sincerely,
Anne Selden Annab

The Golden Rule : a general rule for how to behave that says that you should treat people the way you would like other people to treat you