To the editor:
The 17,000 Palestinian children who have died in the last 15 months of assault on their country did not ask to be killed. Not the ones who died a slow anguished death under the rubble of their bombed-out homes, nor those obliterated by other weaponry provided by our government.
The civilian mothers, fathers, aunts and uncles, grandparents, neighbors and friends who have died, many of them clutching family members in vain attempts to save them, also did not ask for or deserve their fate.
The house our grandparents left to us has not been bulldozed to make room for Israeli settlers eager to build their own homes, as are many of those in Palestine. We have not been shot at or stoned as we gather maple sap from our trees, as are the Palestinian farmers seeking to support their families by making olive oil as their ancestors have for centuries, or our trees burned and destroyed as are theirs.
The children in our communities go to school. Nine out of 10 schools have been severely damaged or destroyed in Gaza. Here our hospitals are able to welcome those of us in need of their care. The 100,000 wounded in Gaza are left with more than half of their hospitals destroyed and the rest damaged and only partially functioning.
Genocidal obliteration of these proportions screams for a response from the world community, from each one of us. Millions around the globe and thousands here at home have taken part in marches, demonstrations, governmental pressure campaigns, fund-raising for relief and yet more must be done. As one response I have decided I need to fast one day a week in solidarity with the more than 1.8 million Palestinians who are facing extremely critical levels of hunger according to aid organizations struggling to avert this cataclysm. The funds I would have spent on food will be among those sent to relief organizations in Gaza.
Each of us has the ability to act in our own way to end this horrific devastation. Since the tragic killing of 1,200 Israelis on October 7, 45,000 Palestinian lives have been taken. It has been said that an eye for an eye will make the whole world blind. Forty-five thousand Palestinian lives lost with no end in sight, for 1,200 Israeli lives lost, is ripping at the world’s soul. In the name of love, and with all the power in our hearts, we must end this madness.
Robin Cappuccino
West Wheelock
Curious did you ever write an op-ed about the Assad Regime. He killed 580K, with chemical weapons. Israel is the new super power in the middle east. The only democracy, and the only country that has consistently been fighting and winning against Islamic Terrorists for 75 years now. In the last year, we have destroyed: Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria, Iran and next up the Houthis – all Islamic Terrorists. I am sorry that there was civilian loss, but such is the case with Urban Warfare, and it all would have stopped if they gave back the hostages. So you can write your Anti-Semitic Op-Eds from rural Vermont, and we Israeli’s couldn’t be happier that Trump is the next president. L’chaim