Bully-in-chief will bolster Israeli aggression
Victor Davis Hanson, in an op-ed piece last Sunday states, “The world’s problem with the Israelis? They are Jews.”
Mr. Hanson has it backward. The problem is with the Israeli government, not the religion. The Jews suffered unspeakable persecution for several centuries, culminating with the Holocaust during World War II. As the truth of that horror was unveiled, much of the world, myself included, cheered the fledgling State of Israel, seeing a long suffering people finally having a homeland.
The fact that most of the citizens of Israel were Jews was immaterial to me.
What caused my disenchantment with the Israelis was that they became bullies. I cheered when Israel opened a corridor to Jerusalem, but as their occupation of the West Bank spread, the Palestinians were displaced and despised, their homeland taken over by “settlements,” I saw the State of Israel as no different from any other aggressor.
The bully-in-chief is soon to be sworn in, and the bullying will get worse. He will cozy up to Vladimir Putin, bolster the Israeli dreams of permanently appropriating the West Bank and order the Army Corps of Engineers to allow completion of the pipeline that threatens the Standing Rock Sioux people.
George Burman, Fresno
This story was originally published January 15, 2017 at 11:26 AM with the headline "Bully-in-chief will bolster Israeli aggression."