Mailbag

     A stressful, arduous, time-sucking week, for reasons beyond Israel — which is really saying something — and too complicated to explain. I'll write about it, eventually. Until then,  time to open up the mailbag with a few of the many emails inspired by my column on the enormity in Israel last Saturday. And to give you a heads up — if a post over the next few weeks is along the lines of, "Hi, busy, talk among yourselves," well, if you could, please roll with it. Lot going on.

Mr. Steinberg,

     Thank you for your op ed in yesterday's paper (How does this end?). I, like you, are not real hopeful. My daughter and I were discussing this tragedy the other day. My daughter, who is an atheist, said this, the worst thing to happen to the human race is religion. I think she might be right.

Susan L.
DeKalb IL

 Dear Ms. .L.:

     A lot of good comes from religion — Dante, Bach, cathedrals — but a lot of bad as well. I tend not to blame religion — I say it's like a hammer: you can build a house with it, or you can hit someone in the head. Same hammer. Ask the question this way: without religion, would human beings be kinder than they are? Probably not. Religion is just the vehicle for channeling that very human tendency to be monstrous. Thanks for writing

     NS

Mr. Steinberg,

     I have read your pieces in the Sun-Times for a long time. Noticeably absent in your piece “How does this end?” was the exploration of how apartheids and genocides have ended, not just political conflicts. Where was the comparison to the Khmer Rouge, Pinochet, Stalin, and colonizers of Africa and the Americas? And while it is not popular in America these days to address the irony and brutality of Israeli-led apartheid tactics and the genocide of Palestinians to Nazi Germany and the Gestapo, you are in a position to delve into this paradox. It’s a fine line to walk without being branded an antisemite, which I know you are not, but you are skilled enough to do it. I am a friend of Jews and Muslims who have family and coworkers in Israel and the occupied West Bank, and our text chains grapple with these issues more profoundly than your article. I challenge you to dig deeper and provide a more nuanced exploration and answers for your millions of readers to “how does it end” than “sit and watch in horror.” You were right that I didn't like your answer - not because it was a brutal truth, but because the question deserved more gradation and exploration. I look forward to future opinions.

Thank you.

Liz D.

     Dear Ms. D.:

     Those are some odd examples you bring up — I assume you just looked for history's villains. The Khmer Rouge won. So did Stalin, judging by the Putin era. The Blacks in South Africa were a huge majority, and they didn't go around killing Afrikaners. But I'm not sure what kind of dialogue can be had with someone who goes on about the brutality of the Israelis, without a word about the Palestinians' refusal to live in peace. A selective sensitivity for brutality. Where was your concern for collective punishment last Saturday? Or more to the point, what is your solution? Were you a Jewish Israeli, how eager would you be to live in a Palestinian state?
     That said, I'm sure you are sincere in your concern for this issue, and appreciate you writing.

      NS 

     Can you please explain the facts around what others have said is the continuing Israeli encroachment and construction of homes in Palestinian territory?
     Thank you,
     Margaret B.

Why? What part don’t you understand?

     My understanding is Israel was not given all the territory after WWII that it is building homes on.

     Yes, and the United States was stolen from the Native-Americans. Yet if one were to kill your grandchildren, you would think poorly of him. Perhaps you might want to extend that same courtesy to the Israelis. Thanks for writing.

NS

Mr. Steinberg,

     Violence between a state and terrorists cannot go on forever and ever. It was unacceptable in Ireland with the British, in Afghanistan, Iraq, Chechnya, Kosovo, Algeria, and it is so between Israel and Hamas.
     Here are some ways to end it.
     The superpowers like a couple of the U.N. security council states must confront both Israel and Hamas and defang them both. Then while they bluster over being forced to disarm, the two sides must be put in a room and kept there until they work out a solution. If not two states, then an intermingled state. If not with their current leadership, then an entirely new set of leaders.
     Or, to borrow Thomas Friedman's word, these knuckleheads use nuclear weapons to shock themselves and the rest of the world into recognizing how this recurrent mayhem ends in searing light and heat and radioactivity. A nuclear weapon is a genie that must never be let out of the bottle, but I can in my worst nightmare imagine the cork pops off because of hate, anger and vengeance for continued wrongs. Lacking reasoned restraint, a nuclear explosion is too possible.
     Or, Israel is forced to vacate Palestine and given another land for their home. Yes, it's in their bible, but the bible is not a real estate covenant no matter the claims it makes. The Jewish people are wonderfully industrious, intelligent and purposeful. If they could make their current landscape bloom, they can do it again elsewhere. The Palestinians will receive their desired land, and the Jews keep their holy sites. I know this is pie in the sky, but anything is better than the blood-soaked sands.
     Or, a no man's land created by and operated by international peacekeepers who do not let hostilities disturb either side.
     Palestinians cannot be pushed into the sea. Jews cannot be eradicated. These recurrent outbreaks of murderous, destructive violence must not continue. The families on both sides, especially the children living through this horror have hate in their hearts. Somehow hope has to push out the hate.
     You, sir, cannot leave me, your reader, hanging in despair over the endless spate of violence. This must stop.
     Don

Dear Mr. N.:

     "Israel is forced to vacate Palestine and given another land for their home." Exactly what other land do you suggest? And how will the people who now have claim to that land feel about it being given away? I appreciate you sharing your plan with me, but it is not what I would call . . . practical.

     NS

Hamas-Israel war reveals university antisemitism

     Hi Neil – in the wake of Hamas' despicable attacks on Israel, many have been shocked to see the level of antisemitic vitriol coming out of America’s universities. . .

     "Reveals"?