Nesrine Malik’s desolate picture of an impending age of total immorality captures the desperation of the moment (A new terror has entered the Gaza war: that it is ushering in an age of total immorality, 29 July). But recently, I attended a talk by Dr Ramzy Baroud, editor of the Palestine Chronicle, speaking with his daughter, Zarefah, who is researching the imprisonment and torture of Palestinians over the last century. They presented a more hopeful picture of the future, pointing to three things in particular.
First, the unbelievable resistance of the Palestinians, including those emerging from Israeli military prisons. The Palestinians have fiercely resisted all their history. If they can show fortitude in face of such relentless persecution then so can and must we.
Second, public opinion in the west has fundamentally shifted. The truth of the experience of Palestinians is vastly more widely acknowledged and talked about. The fear of talking about the persecution meted out by Israel is dissipating.
Third, a key role of Israel in the Middle East to secure western interests, such as access to oil and protection of trade routes, is being systematically undermined by Israel itself. Trade routes are already severely compromised, and wider war seems imminent. A time is coming when Israel is no longer a net asset for western interests in the region. Israel’s free rein to persecute the Palestinians may be pulled back.
Ramzy Baroud’s advice: stay strong, keep campaigning, and keep promoting the voice of Palestinians, not just the voice of our own desperation.
Duncan Fisher
Crickhowell, Powys
• Nesrine Malik writes of “Israel’s relentless erasure of families, homes, culture and infrastructure”. Earlier this year, at the Whitworth gallery in Manchester, I saw an exhibition of Palestinian embroidery, charting its evolution over the past century. Stunningly beautiful and complex garments were on display. While there, I bought a book, Palestinian Costume by Shelagh Weir.
Even though I am well aware of the history of Palestine and Israel, the photos in this book stunned me. Photos from the early 20th century of women sitting outside their homes passing on their embroidery skills to the next generation. Photos of weavers preparing the fabrics. Photos of family celebrations, the participants dressed in garments of wonderful complexity.
Why did these pictures from so long ago upset me? They were taken in places that are now in Israel or the occupied territories. They brought home the desperation of peoples whose way of life, traditions and culture had been ripped from them.
However much history you know, just look at the faces of the people turned off their land, moved from place to place, their lives torn apart. It happened in the middle of last century and is still happening.
For peace, it must stop.
Nina Punt
London
• I was at Oxford in May 1956 when the philosopher Elizabeth Anscombe voted against the granting of an honorary doctorate to Harry Truman, who as US president had signed off the dropping of nuclear bombs on Japan. Anscombe’s argument was essentially that “to kill the innocent as a means to one’s end is murder”. “We all lose our humanity if we get used to the horrors of Gaza,” says the headline on Nesrine Malik’s article in the Guardian’s print edition. Perhaps we are less likely to lose our humanity if we insist that the killing of the innocent to serve our ends is always murder.
Rev Dr Peter B Godfrey
King’s Stanley, Gloucestershire
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