36 Days to Go – Time to Act – Do it NOW!

By Sherwin Pomerantz

With 36 days to go to the opening of the UN General Assembly and the vote on Palestinian statehood this is our chance to be heard and to make it known to those who will vote how we feel on the issue.

For some months now I have been urging my readers to write letters to the UN delegates voicing their opinion and now is the time to do so. Following is the text of the letter I have sent today to all of the delegates:

===============================================================================

H.E. Mr. Zahir Tanin
Ambassador of Afghanistan to the UN
633 3rd Ave., 27th Fl.
New York NY 10017

Your Excellency,

I am writing to you as an Israeli citizen urging you to vote NO on the issue of Palestinian statehood if it comes up at the UN General Assembly in September.

You should know that the overwhelming majority of my countrymen desire peace with our Palestinian neighbors, are prepared to make serious sacrifices to achieve that peace and, like them, want our children and grandchildren to be able to live successful and fulfilling lives without the need to go to war in every generation.

We would welcome the opportunity, in the framework of true and lasting peace and an end to the conflict, to work with our neighbors to continue to build what we have begun here over the last 63 years, a knowledge-based society with sufficient economic stability to weather any economic downturn.

But such peace can only come when and if the two parties are prepared to sit down together and discuss all of the issues, without preconditions and without the interference of outside forces. As such, a vote at the UN General Assembly to recognize Palestinian statehood is simply counter-productive and runs the risk of unleashing forces here, on both sides, that could be both uncontrollable and detrimental to achieving what we all want.

As such, I urge you to vote NO and give a message to all of us here that the UN is only prepared to move in this direction once the parties involved have settled their differences and announced an end to the conflict.

Thank you for reading this letter and I hope you will be moved to act accordingly for the good and welfare of all of us who live here.

Sincerely yours,

===============================================================================

I urge everyone to do something similar using your own language of course. Once again I am attaching the list of delegates and their addresses.

There will come a time at the end of each of our days when, according to tradition, we will be asked to make an accounting of our deeds, good and bad. We dare not run the risk of saying that when the chips were down, when our people needed us, we remained silent. I have no guarantee that any of this will do any good but just in case it will be helpful, we dare not remain mute!!! If you care, take the time, make the effort, do it now!