As I read news from the Middle East, I can’t help but cry. I sit in the comfort of my dorm room while people all over the world are suffering. Human beings, people like you and me, are being treated like animals.

For example, the Palestinian people are being oppressed as the world sits back and watches. No wait, we aren’t sitting back and watching, we are helping.

The United States is doing much more than sitting back and watching. We are actively helping the Israeli government and the Israeli occupation forces dehumanize an entire society and make life so miserable for the Palestinian people so that they feel they have no reason left to live. We are helping in several ways.

The first and largest way is by pumping billions of dollars into Israel. The United States gives more than 3 billion dollars a year to a country that is terrorizing an entire population. Examples of this massive assistance are the Israeli Apache helicopters and Israeli F-16s that the Israeli military uses to attack civilian populations. These sophisticated weapons are made in the United States.

A second way is that we turn a blind eye to Israel’s refusal to abide by international agreements. The Israelis, to this day, refuse to honor U.N. Resolution 242. Written in 1967, Resolution 242 demands the “withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict.” This resolution declares Israeli occupation of the West Bank, and other territories won in the 1967 war between Jordan and Israel, illegal under international law. As the world’s only superpower we could, but don’t, insist that Israel comply with such resolutions. On the other hand, we insist that countries like Iraq do comply.

One way to solve this growing problem in the Middle East is through justice. The Palestinian people deserve their own state, and the Israeli people deserve to live in peace. Humans deserve to be treated like humans.

Building dirt walls around cities so that people cannot leave, or enforcing 24-hour curfews for months at a time, is not how people should be treated. Being afraid to ride the bus, or being afraid to go out to the market because of suicide attacks, are not fears that people should live with. Hope is not lost. There are organizations on both sides of the conflict that lobby for a just ending to the occupation.

We need to show our support of these groups. Know that while there are a select few radicals that support the oppressive and destructive ways of both the Israelis and the Palestinians, there are also many more people that support a peaceful and just resolution.

We can do our part by encouraging our representatives to end our support of Israeli policies and by first voicing our opinion against war with Iraq.

This war will only inflame an already heated conflict. Another is to support nonviolent means to end the oppressive and illegal Israeli occupation of the West Bank. Wage peace now.

Ramsey G. Tesdell

Freshman

Technical Communication