Madam, - In his letter (June 28th), John Lalor from Tel Aviv takes issue with my article "Segregation Wall strangles the life out of Bethlehem", (June 24th), noting inter alia, that ". . .Kelly paints an idyllic picture of the Palestinian people as peace-loving innocents".
This is totally untrue as I said nothing of the sort, and I ask Mr Lalor to reread my article more carefully. The only racist comment I made, and with due apology at having to make it, was to say how the individual Israeli was a decent and regular person, and expressing my genuine bewilderment as to how their government believes, as I presume it must, that its strategy of throwing people out of their homes, giving them less respect than animals, taking their land, destroying their farms, closing their shops, hotels and schools, and paralysing their universities, all of which I witnessed first hand, is the path to peace with their neighbours.
I repeat my opinion for what it's worth, as an independent and apolitical observer, that the construction of an eight-metre high wall around the small town of Bethlehem, thereby effectively making it a ghetto for the Palestinians inside, is an absurd, ineffective and senseless strategy, and that it will unquestionably generate a hostile backlash from the Palestinian community. It is also in gross violation of international laws and United Nations resolutions.
If Mr Lalor's attitude to the hostility and terrible suicide bombings by Palestinians is representative of the Israeli government's, as with enormous sorrow I fear that it is, then there can be little hope of peace in that tragic part of our world. I wonder too why our European governments stand back and watch it all happening. - Yours, etc,
JOHN KELLY, Donnybrook, Dublin 4.