A different perspective on Barak

After reading the Light’s Nov. 9 article “Ehud Barak urges leaders to talk less, act more,” I would like to remind everyone that this is the same man, who as Israeli Prime Minister in 2000, was ready to summarily give the store away — surrender Gaza, the entire West Bank and East Jerusalem — to that notorious gangster, the late PLO Chairman  Yasser Arafat, in return for peace with Israel. 

That  Barak, Israel’s most decorated soldier, would even consider such a ludicrous, irrational proposition defies belief, and the fact that Arafat rejected such an offer was, in plain words, insane. Barak’s proposition can best be characterized as misguided, ascribing to a convoluted theory of ready, fire, aim. 

Then and now, four things must need to happen before Israel enters into any peace negotiations:  

• Palestinians must first recognize Israel’s existence, and then as a corollary,  Israel’s right to exist

• Palestinians must unequivocally and categorically recognize Israel as the Jewish state

• Palestinians must accept the fact that Jerusalem will never again be divided and will always remain a part of Israel and its capital

• Palestinians must abrogate their insistence on the right of return, lest Jews be the minority in their own homeland.

I would refute Barak’s argument of talking less and acting more, by advocating just the opposite — talking more and acting less. 

Suffice it to say, had Barak prevailed, and had Arafat accepted the former Prime Minister’s proposition, no doubt, there would have existed the real possibility of a two-state “solution.” Unfortunately, however, chances are, much to the detriment of Israel, both would have been Palestinian.

Gene Carton

Olivette

‘We Reap What We Sow’

Now that the unholy alliance of Jared Kushner (Donald Trump’s Jewish son-in-law), the Trump presidential campaign, President-Elect Trump, and Steve Bannon and the Breitbart organization has been exposed to the rest of the world, I sincerely hope I do not hear outrage or consternation from the Jewish community about the proliferation of anti-Semitism, swastikas or hate speech in the public square, for certainly our credibility is severely damaged.

I am reminded of the idolators in Exodus and say to the Jewish community, “we reap what we sow.”

Eedie Weis Cuminale

Overland, Mo.