The United States needs to be more supporting of Israel in the Middle East conflict. How can the United States be critical of Israel when they are doing exactly what we are doing? They are waging a war on terrorism. President Bush said after Sept. 11, “We will not negotiate with terrorists.” And now his administration has sent Secretary of State Colin Powell to negotiate with Yasser Arafat.

Yasser Arafat supports the terrorist activities of the suicide bombers, the Hamas, the Fatah and the Islamic Jihad.

That makes Yasser Arafat a terrorist.

Yassar Arafat was told to arrest the suicide bombers, the Hamas and the Islamic Jihad. Yasser Arafat did not. The suicide bombings continued.

The Israeli army had to do Yasser Arafat’s job for him. They had to go in and arrest the terrorists, the suicide bombers, the Hamas, the Fatah and the Islamic Jihad.

There is now a conflict going on in the Middle East. And the Israeli operation needs to be allowed to complete or they will have to invade the Palestinian controlled towns in the future to finish.

The United States needs to tread softly in Israel. Hopefully the Israelis were not offended by our saber rattling for them to pull out of the Palestinian controlled towns.

Benjamin T. Rittgers

Senior

Computer science