The following message was sent to Morning Edition, National Public Radio, 5/15/01:
Israel has apparently gotten the green light from the Bush Administration to wage total war against the Palestinians. Assassinations, torture, kidnapping, murder of rock-throwing kids have become commonplace. Recently the warfare has escalated to include invasion of Palestinian territory by Israeli troops, tanks, helicopter gunships, with wholesale attacks on civilians, Palestinian Authority Security forces and infrastructure.
Surely Morning Edition can't be blind to the connection between the US blanket protection of Israel and the UN vote to deny the US a seat on the Human Rights Commission. Despite heavy coverage of the lost seat, NPR broadcasts did not include a single word suggesting that the US unilateral protection for Israel was among the reasons the US was rejected.
In the eyes of the world, the US repeatedly abuses its veto power in the Security Council to thwart investigations, observers, and condemnations of Israel's attacks and violations of UN Resolutions 194, 242, and 338. The mainstream media (including NPR) is totally responsible for the distortion in the perception of the US public of the Middle East struggle. Your anti-Arab pro-Israel racist propaganda is unrelenting.
A much-needed history lesson would remind the US public that it was the UN which created Israel in 1948. Now the UN, the source of Israel's legitimacy, is despised by Israel because of requirements that displaced Arabs be allowed to return to lands seized by the invading Jews in 1948 (UN Resolution 194). Further UN Resolutions, 242 and 338, require Israel to withdraw from the land seized from the Palestinians in the War of 1967, Gaza, The West Bank, and East Jerusalem. In rejecting the UN demands, Israel, with protection and support of the US, denies the very foundation of its own creation. Such self-contradiction cannot go without consequences.
For additional commentary on the Middle East struggle, link to: