Israeli history
Your correspondent's, Mr. Duncan Ives, understanding of the history and geography of Israel is somewhat lacking (in Your Letter column of The Jakarta Post, Dec. 21, 1994).
There was never an 'invasion' of Palestine by Israelis! The Jews lived in the same towns and villages, or in neighboring areas. Even now, the only way into my Israeli friends' village is through an Arab one. They live in peace together. In 1948 the combined Armies of the Arabs, trained and armed by the British and French, tried to wipe out 600,000 Jews, who had virtually no weapons. Incredibly, the former lost!
As Mr. Ives states, Israel is (mostly) situated on what was formerly a semi arid piece of desert. Now it has been transformed into green farmlands and orchards. It didn't get that way by itself. The Israelis (the majority of whom are Jewish refugees from Arab countries) made it happen.
If Gaza and Jericho are rundown and dirty, then I would suggest that the Palestinians get off their backsides and change it. If they need more land (prior to the return of the West Bank in the near future) then the land just to the South of Gaza is just as good as that to the North. If the Israelis built farms and popular tourist villages there, why can't the Palestinians? When the Israelis controlled adjacent Sinai, there were very strict conservation laws--and it was beautiful. Now, as The Jakarta Post points out, all the wild animals are slaughtered by poachers: "1000 gazelles killed in one area alone in the past five years"--and the coral is being destroyed by bomb fishing. When there is nothing left to see, what tourist will bother to go to look?
Probably the peace deal will be a failure. Not because of any lack of effort by Rabin, Peres, King Hussein, or even Arafat. But because the Palestinians are seemingly incapable of organizing themselves to make a success of it. It is so much easier to stand about and shout how deprived you are, than to accept that you are no worse off than millions of others. It is so much easier for their fellow Moslems (and Christians) abroad to push out the same old propaganda, than to put their hands in their pockets to find the money for a new school or hospital for Gaza. And it is far easier for the Hamas psychopaths to put a bomb on a bus, than to work for a living. Regrettably Mr. Ives, I would suspect that Shamir is correct and the Palestinians will throw peace and nationhood away. They are their own worst enemies!
JAMES DENNISON
Jakarta