To the Editor:

Re: “Race, Empire and Palestine: A World View,” Opinion, Oct. 22

I was deeply offended by this column. The author’s claims of Israel’s imperialism and racist policies simply do not bear out in practice.

The author appeals to the discredited notion that Zionism is racism in order to support his claim of Israeli apartheid. He also confuses Judaism as a religion with Jews as an ethnic group. Zionism is the belief in an ethnic Jewish right to self-determination in the historical Jewish homeland, the type of right the author surely supports for Palestinians.

The unique denial of such a right as it applies specifically to Jews itself seems racist. Regarding the claim of apartheid, Israel gives its Arab minority full and equal citizenship. Compare this with Jordan, which still prohibits Jews from becoming citizens. The notion that Israel “segregates” the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, which would form the basis for any future Palestinian state, is absurd. Would we say the United States is segregating Mexicans or Canadians by restricting their movement into the country? Israel, like any sovereign nation, has the right and duty to take reasonable precautions to defend its citizens. Palestinian terrorism against Israel existed before the security fence and checkpoints. In fact, it existed before any Israeli presence in the West Bank and Gaza. The security fence and checkpoints may be inconvenient, but these measures have proven effective in preventing terrorist attacks. Moreover, in substantially reducing the number of checkpoints, Israel has demonstrated that as terrorism disappears, so will these security measures.

The author speaks of the Palestinian refugee problem, but he ignores its causes. Initially, Palestinian refugees indeed numbered somewhere between 400,000 and 1,000,000. However, most left their land voluntarily during the 1947-1948 war, in which five unprovoked Arab nations attacked the newly established Jewish state. The Palestinian refugee problem persists not because of any action by Israel. Between 1948 and 1967, Jordan and Egypt controlled the West Bank and Gaza Strip, respectively. They could have solved the refugee problem, but chose not to. By comparison, more than 800,000 Jews were expelled from Arab nations following Israel’s establishment. There is no Jewish refugee problem because Israel accepted these individuals with open arms.

In trying to establish a Jewish state, Jews have always conceded a similar Arab right. The Jews accepted the 1937 Peel Commission partition plan, while the Arabs rejected the very notion of a Jewish state in the region. Then Palestinian leader Haj Amin Al-Husseini even proposed that Hitler implement his Final Solution in the Middle East. The Jews again accepted the 1947 UN Partition Plan that would have established both a Jewish state and, for the first time in history, a sovereign Palestinian state. The Arabs nations responded with war.

Israel has proven its commitment to peace. In making peace with Egypt in 1979 and Jordan in 1994, it made substantial concessions, including relinquishing land. It has offered the Palestinians their own state at various times, including 1967, 2000 and 2008. It even unilaterally withdrew from Gaza in 2005, only to be faced with thousands of rockets fired with the explicit intent of murdering Israeli civilians.

Israel is committed to living peacefully with its Arab neighbors in a land inhabited by Jews for 4,000 years. It is the Arabs who have continuously rejected the Jewish right to self-determination, at the continued cost of an independent Palestinian state. Who then are the real imperialists?

Zachary Shapiro ’10