Two Letters That The Times Wouldn't Touch


The New York Times printed three letters in response to the op-ed it printed on Sabra-Shatila.

The one by the Israeli consul essentially said, "Why are you bringing up all that old stuff. Look at what Arabs are doing in Syria!" The second one is from an expert on the Reagan administration of which he admires. It's three paragraphs are worth reading. It uses the word "complicity" in describing what Reagan's people did in those days and gives the excuses. The third letter also uses the word "complicity" and forthrightly condemns it.

Here are two letters the Times didn't print:

To the Editor:

The article "A Preventable Massacre" by Seth Anziska (September 16, 2012) turns on its head the facts of the Beirut massacre. There is definitive evidence of Israeli preparation, direction and participation in the massacre at Sabra and Shatila with American foreknowledge.

We entered Sabra on September 18th,1982 thirty minutes after the last wave of slaughter, photographed the carnage and, over four days, interviewed survivors. Our interviews are supplemented by the meticulous research conducted over two decades by Bayan Nuwayhed al-Hout and published as "Sabra and Shatila: September 1982" (Pluto Press).

"A Preventable Massacre" fails to cite the plethora of reports confirming direct involvement of the Israeli Defense Forces. A participant in the slaughter gave a harrowing account in Der Spiegel (February 14, 1983) entitled "Each of You Is An Avenger." Directives given the Tiger Militia of Camille Chamoun by Israeli officers in unmarked Phalange uniforms are set forth with particulars of the Israeli role in performing this work with bayonets and knives.

"We went past bodies, stumbled over bodies, shot and stabbed all eyewitnesses." The account cites the role of Israeli officers and of Israeli army bulldozers under instruction to "plow everything under the ground. Don't let any witnesses stay alive."

Prior to the invasion of Lebanon in 1982, Ariel Sharon and Bashir Gemayel declared on separate occasions that they would reduce the Palestinians in Lebanon from 500,000 to 50,000 people.

Ha'aretz recounted on September 26, 1982 the high level planning that preceded the invasion in service to "the long term objective aimed at the expulsion of the whole Palestinian population of Lebanon beginning with Beirut."

The London Sunday Times reported on the same day: "This carefully pre-planned military operation to 'purge' the camps was called Moah Barzel (Iron Brain); the plan was familiar to Sharon and Begin and part of Sharon's larger plan discussed by the Israeli cabinet on July 17."

It is surely fitting that on the 30th anniversary of this great crime, its underlying dynamics are acknowledged together with the appropriate moral and political conclusions.

Mya Shone
Ralph Schoenman


Dear Editor:

The fine op-ed on the Sabra-Shatila massacre mentions that the U.S. government agreed to "written guarantees to protect the Palestinian civilians remaining in the camps". However, to this day the U.S. government has never asked the Lebanese government to launch a serious investigation to identify and arrest the killers of those Palestinians. The U.S. has never even made its own report on why it ignored its written agreement and allowed the Palestinian civilians to be undefended in the midst of obvious grave peril. Both these actions should be taken by the Obama administration without delay.

Stanley Heller
Executive Director
Middle East Crisis Committee
Woodbridge, CT