Israel is the World's Canary

The following letter was published in the Waterbury Republican-American, Thursday, June 21. The headline given somewhat distorts the main message, implying that it is Israel that needs support rather than it is the world which needs to support Israel as it fights our battles.

Israel Needs Support from United States in War on Terror

The implications of the Associated Press article, "Israel without ways to prevent rocket attacks," published Sunday, June 10, should be of serious concern to everyone in the Western world.

Time and again, we have paid scant attention as Arab terrorists attacked Israel.

But the weapons used against Israel are always eventually used against us, other Western countries and even the very states that supported their use against Jews in Israel.

Suicide bombings did not stay confined to Israeli cities. Terrorists tried to destroy the tallest building in Israel, the Shalom Tower in Tel Aviv, before destroying the World Trade Center.

Last summer, thousands of rockets and missiles were launched at Israeli cities and towns by Hamas, Hizbullah and other terrorist groups, with the support of Iran and Syria.

Hundreds have been launched from Gaza at the Israeli city of Sderot in the last month, making that city unlivable and causing serious emotional trauma to everyone there.

If this terror tactic continues to be used successfully against Israelis, it inevitably will spread.

For our own good, it is imperative that we support whatever steps Israel takes to defeat these terrorists.

If Israel is reluctant to do what's necessary, the international community should go into Gaza, dismantle the Palestinian Authority, disarm the terrorists and start building a civil society there.

Alan Stein
Waterbury

The writer is president of Promoting Responsibility in Middle East Reporting, PRIMER-Connecticut (www.primerct.org).

In the week and a half between the time the letter was submitted and the time it was published, events somewhat overtook the content, with the Palestinian Authority splitting itself in two, but the need to prevent the spread of Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood remains.

Generally overlooked because Fatah is not quite as extreme as Hamas is the fact that Fatah is also an extremist terrorist group; we should have learned from the way all the weaponry we gave Fatah in Gaza fell into the hands of Hamas that it is dangerous to prop up Fatah; we should also remember that when Fatah is not using its weapons against Hamas it is using them against Israel.