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Howard Erdunast (Try other options, Letters, August 2) asks why not a three state solution, with Jordan and Egypt given control of the West Bank and Gaza respectively, given that they both have been good neighbours, under the misapprehension that the West Bank was once part of Jordan and Gaza part of Egypt.
This is a really bad idea, not least because the peace treaties Israel shares with them are a cold peace, unlike with the Arab states participating in the Abraham Accords.
The peace holds for now because both countries are deterred from attacking Israel militarily, knowing that they are weaker. When Trans Jordan invaded Israel in the war of extermination by six Arab countries in 1948, fledgling Israel was unable to liberate Judea and Samaria before the ceasefire. Trans Jordan held it, renaming itself Jordan, and renamed the land the West Bank to obliterate the Jewish connection. It brutally ethnically cleansed it of every last Jew, trashing all 58 synagogues in Jerusalem’s Old City, and amongst many other outrages used headstones from the oldest Jewish cemetery on the Mount of Olives as paving stones, vandalising that holy place.
It annexed the land in 1950, in an annexation recognised only by Great Britain and Pakistan. It was the only time in 3,700 years of Jewish history that Jerusalem’s Old City was judenrein.
Similarly, Egypt controlled Gaza as a result of military conquest.
Giving up land to hostile entities has always weakened Israeli defence, especially given its tiny size. The only solution is for Israel’s neighbours to accept that she is here to stay, and enter into good neighbourly relations with her. Why is that such a big ask?
Warren S Grossman
London E11
I have read with great interest the passionate debate between Eda Spinka, who argued for Israel to encompass the entire biblical land, including Judea and Samaria, and Anthony Melnikoff, who defended the two-state solution in order to maintain a Jewish majority in Israel. This has been an ongoing debate for at least a century within the Zionist movement, which just goes to show that there is no easy solution to the underlying security and demographic conundrum.
In my opinion, neither the two-state solution nor Greater Israel are viable options. A fully sovereign Palestine would pose such an existential and geostrategic risk for the Jewish state that no Israeli government could ever accept it (as per Ms Spinka), whereas a unitary state between the river and sea would undermine the Jewish identity of the country due to the demographic factors cited by Mr Melnikoff.
However, there are other more viable options. I favour the proposal of former US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman. According to Friedman's plan, Israel should apply sovereignty over Judea and Samaria, where Arabs would have local autonomy, however, they would not vote in national elections (just as Puerto Ricans residing on the island cannot vote in US elections). The Puerto Rico-model would offer dignity and self-rule for the Arab population, whereas it would also guarantee better security for Israel without turning it into a bi-national state.
Miklós Cseszneky
Spalding PE11
James R. Windsor, in reply to my letter of July 26 concerning the Two State Solution (which in turn was a reply to Eda Spinka’s letter of July 19), writes: “It is high time that Israeli civilian law is applied to Judea and Samaria under de jure Israeli sovereignty, becoming part of Israel proper, leaving the Arab and other minorities to continue to enjoy their freedoms in their autonomous areas, provided they are law abiding, but without giving them Israeli citizenship.”
For many years, going right back to my student days during the Six Day War, I have vigorously defended Israeli against false accusations that it is an apartheid state. The UN definition of Apartheid is: “The implementation and maintenance of a system of legalised racial segregation in which one racial group is deprived of political and civil rights.” The current state of Israel, clearly, is not an apartheid state.
The state as proposed by Mr Windsor almost certainly would be. Can he clarify that this is what he has in mind?
Anthony Melnikoff
Barnet, Herts
You rightly call for the punishment of any soldier guilty of the alleged abuse of Gazan terrorists at the Sde Teiman military compound, and given the robust legal system in Israel, that will surely happen (Israel must punish any soldier guilty of abuse, August 2).
However, your accusation of a “far right mob” intervening to prevent the detention of soldiers is inflammatory, especially as the details have not fully emerged.
You extol Israel’s “proud democracy”, yet your divisive comment disrespects it when it doesn’t produce the result you favour, as in the result of the last election.
Given the tsunami of antisemitism Jews are experiencing worldwide, with Israel fighting an existential war, it is not asking too much of a leading Jewish newspaper to act responsibly, and not give more ammunition to the antisemites, who will use your leader to falsely claim that the abuse of prisoners by Israel is the norm, not the exception.
Colin Rossiter
London WC2
Simon Rocker may be right that there has been a pragmatic acceptance of eruvim in liberal north London, but the profound philosophical objections to them remain (Carry on Shabbat:The normalisation of the Eruv, August 2). In a modern, secular and democratic society, it is preposterous that an ancient biblical law prohibiting Jews from carrying anything more than four cubits from a private to a public domain or vice versa, on Shabbat, should be used to justify the erection of a wire boundary in suburbia.
Imagine what would happen if Muslims or Hindus decided to fence themselves off because of some obscure religious requirement. At a time when identity politics is tearing this country apart, we should be promoting peaceful integration rather than a divisive ghetto mentality.
Stan Labovitch
Windsor
Mazeltov and an Eskimo Roll to Jessica Fox for winning her gold medal in the women’s kayak slalom at the Paris Olympics. In our shul, Western Marble Arch Synagogue, at the last AGM it was decided to reduce the number of elderly participants in the Board of Management by forming a separate Committee of Elders until we realised this was “C of E” for short. This body has yet to meet in accordance with the rules; until then it is referred to as the Alter Kayakers.
Bernard Silver
London NW1