Looking for ideas

Nina Tannenwald (March 2022) uses the specious argument that consensus among leftist groups critical of Israel is proof of malfeasance. Israel is a democracy with Arabs having full rights to vote and serve in the Knesset. There is an Arab party now part of the Knesset ruling coalition. This alone should be proof Israel is not an apartheid state.
The democratically elected government is aware it has a duty to protect the citizens of the country. Unfortunately, Israel is situated in a neighborhood where tyranny and Jew-hatred is prevalent. There is a cold peace with Egypt and Jordan, mainly because these countries have been defeated trying to destroy Israel. Lebanon is a failed client state of Iran, a country dedicated to destroying Israel. Syria is a failed state, increasingly under the control of Iran.
Israel withdrew from Gaza. Gaza is now ruled by Hamas, a terrorist group not satisfied with destroying Israel, but having in its charter a mission to kill all Jews on earth. Israel reluctantly controls the Arab population of Judea and Samaria (the West Bank). Israel has granted autonomy for civil affairs to the Palestinian Authority. The Palestinian Authority is a corrupt kleptocracy ruled by Mahmoud Abbas, who began his 4-year term as president in 2005, having repeatedly found excuses to not hold another election. The Palestinian Authority still gives bonuses and stipends to family members of terrorists who are imprisoned or have died attacking Israeli civilians.
Israel does the best it can to balance the rights and safety of its citizens and Arabs in the territories it holds against the security needs of controlling a hostile population. Previous withdrawals, sometimes wishfully thought of as “land for peace,” have led to land for terrorist enclaves. I would like to see if Prof. Tannenwald has any ideas of how to pacify the terrorist organizations with which Israel has to deal, and if she is at least as vehement in criticizing the human rights records of Israel’s neighbors.

Farrel I. Klein
Providence, RI