Hiram Cohen in his letter ("Jews deserve to live in homeland," June 3) tried to trivialize and dismiss Zuhair Al-Atwi's letter ("Billboard focuses on a vital issue," May 26) by labeling it "...a bizarre Israel-hating proclamation...." He then changed the subject to the historical suffering of Jews at the hands of the Europeans ("...the killing of Jewish children, women and men was habitual") and today the Arabs in the Middle East ("Many of them support Hamas, which calls for the extermination of the Jews") without providing any background as to why these attitudes persist throughout history.
He asks "...why can't 300,000 Jews live peacefully in their counties of origin?" His reference to a 17th-century scholar's anecdotal description of Jews inhabiting the vicinity of present-day Israel is not a land deed establishing original ownership.
The subject of the "Stop 30 Billion" billboard and Mr. Al-Atwi's opinion is the provision of $30 billion in weaponry by the United States to Israel to be directed against its regional neighbors. The population of Israel is slightly over 8 million with 6 million Jews. That converts to our government assessing every man, woman and child in the U.S. $95 to provide $3,750 for every Israeli citizen.
There are 5.5 million survivors of the white man's genocide against Native Americans evacuated onto desolate lands in the U.S.; many live in extreme poverty. There is no unconditional sympathetic support for restoring them to their ancestral lands. The expansion of Israeli settlements into occupied Palestinian lands, backed by overwhelming U.S.-provided firepower, is a repetition of a proven process.