91 Days to Go
What Can YOU do?

By Sherwin Pomerantz

With 91 days left to the opening of the United Nations General Assembly’s 2011 session in New York and the General Assembly’s vote on recognizing Palestinian statehood people are asking me, ok, what can we do to help? So here goes, a short list of what I urge us to do.

As I have mentioned before I think it is important that delegates to the UN know how those of us who care about Israel feel about this vote. Some of my readers have already done so but it seems to me that if there would be a groundswell of mail to each and every one of the delegates to the UN in New York that at least it will be obvious to all of them that WE CARE! Attached is a now complete list of every delegation, the name of the Ambassador to the UN from each country as well as the address, and, where available, the fax number and e mail address as well. Please consider doing this and doing it NOW.

The American Jewish Committee has started a petition to be sent to Nicolas Sarkozy of France and David Cameron in the UK urging them to vote no. The petition can be accessed at

http://www.ajc.org/c.ijITI2PHKoG/b.7515195/k.1525/Speak_out_against_Palestinian_unilateralism/siteapps/advocacy/ActionItem.aspx?msource=0611UDI2e

Please consider adding your name to this letter and letting these two important figures know how you feel.

If you believe as I do that Prime Minister Netanyahu is not being aggressive enough in stating Israel’s case and that he needs to pursue additional diplomatic avenues with the Palestinians then you can also write to the Prime Minister and let him know how you feel. You can send an e mail communication to the Prime Minister by going to the following site

http://www.pmo.gov.il/PMOEng/Public+Applications/PublicApplications/

and letting him know how you feel. We are confident that every piece of correspondence submitted in this manner gets read.

Finally it may be time to demonstrate. Our people have a proud history of mounting significant demonstrations in support of issues that we hold dear. Many of you recall the demonstrations in Washington DC some years ago on behalf of Soviet Jewry. In Israel large demonstrations in Rabin Square in Tel Aviv have often forced the government to act. It is beyond me why the people of Israel and our brethren around the world are not more vocal than they are about issues that clearly impact on the survival of this country as a Jewish and democratic state. We should be on the streets telling our governments how we feel.

History has taught us all too often that we cannot put our total faith and trust in others to support us and protect us. In 1944, in the midst of World War II David Ben Gurion, soon to be the first Prime Minister of the new State of Israel said “We must master our fate, we must take destiny into our own hands.” Those words are no less true today than they were 67 years ago when he made that statement. The time to act is NOW! Hopefully we are up to the challenge.