Wednesday, April 30, 1986
Daily Nebraskan
Page 5
Palestinians have logical right to their homeland
I am writing with regard to Elizabeth Cannon's
letter (Daily Nebraskan, April 24) titled "Reagan
met Khadafy on Desert Terms."
My main concern is the misleading arguments
about the Palestinian problem. Cannon wrote
that the Palestinians have not been given "a
home in the countries to which they fled and the
responsibility for this must be laid squarely at
the feet of their Arab brethern." She added that
those Arabs "have made no significant efforts to
assimilate them."
It is a historical fact that for many centuries
the Palestinians, until 1948 when they were
forced out to leave their homes and to live in
refugee camps in the neighboring Arab countries,
were the settlers of the land of Palestine.
Actually, the Palestinians were there before
prophet Moses led the Israelites to Palestine.
Logically, then, the Palestinians do have the
right to own the land of Palestine.
Also, logically, instead of blaming the Arabs,
who, indeed, have been generous hosts, for not
assimilating (assimilation means forgetting the
homeland Israel's wishful thinking) the
Palestinians, one must turn to Israel to blame
and try for its crimes of driving the Palestinians
out from their homeland and, later, massacring
them in the refugee camps.
Abdullah Hamad
linguistics
Waldheim: 'obscene opportunist'
COHEN from Page 4
Legally, there will never be a case against
Waldheim. He is what he appears to be: an
obscene opportunist. Now, running for the presi
dency of Austria, he sees yet another opportunity.
By admitting nothing, he rejects the past. By not
even acknowledging that he knew of atrocities,
he denies any complicity and responsibility. By
stating that he did not even learn of the
atrocities until accused of them, he displays his
indifference. If his standing in the polls proves
anything, it is that this pose is tremendously
popular with the people of his country.
Of course, it is easy to condemn from the
United States events that occurred 45 years ago
in Europe. Readers reminded me of that, when
last I wrote about Waldheim. They said you had
to be there. They told of the terror, the horror
the inability of a single person to stop it, to even
make a difference. A letter told of the good
people who did nothing how Jewish families
disappeared and every one pretended that noth
ing had happened.
But Waldheim is a world leader. His dossier
proclaims it. He is running for the presidency of
a European country a mostly empty office,
ceremonial at best, but an elected post nonethe
less. It is a country, though, with a Nazi past. A
German-speaking cousin, it rejoined the family
with the Anschluss. Austrians greeted German
tanks with flowers, and Austrians like Waldheim
served in the German army. To many, Germany
did not conquer Austria; it liberated it. Hitler,
after all, was an Austrian himself.
The Austrians who will vote in the presidential
elections know that the issue is not whether
Waldheim can legally be prosecuted. The ques
tion is not whether there is a hard and fast legal
case against him witnesses, documents and,
of course, the awful tales of survivors. No. The
issue is Waldheim's refusal to acknowledge his
role in what may be history's greatest crime, to
say that he was there and he is sorry.
Probably Austria, like Germany, is tired of
guilt. That's understandable. Probably Austria,
like Germany, is tired of being told it was a
criminal, a beast, cruel, awful and collectively
responsible for the atrocities of the war. Probably
many Germans and Austrians think it is time the
world acknowledged or at least conceded that
Germans and Austrians are no different than
other people: What would you have done? How
would you have been different? Would you have
risked your life for someone else? And can a
nation that fears a European vacation because of
terrorism fault others for a lack of courage?
These are all good questions, but Kurt Wald
heim does not pose them. Instead, he ducks
them. With repellent agility, he leaps from lie to
lie, knowing that a legal case can not be brought
for the moral crime of omission. With every
exoneration, the case against him grows harder
and harder, but Waldheim knows only the voters
of Austria can convict. With confidence, he
awaits the election. With dread, so do we.
1 986, Washington Post Writers Group
Cohen writes an editorial column forthe Washing
ton Post.
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