To the Editor:
Re “I Am Gaza City’s Mayor. Our Lives and Culture Are in Rubble,” by Yahya R. Sarraj (Opinion visitor essay, nytimes.com, Dec. 24):
Mr. Sarraj, I really feel unhappy studying your piece. I’m notably mourning the lack of your eldest son and the destruction of these elements of Gaza which have impressed you all through your life. These horrible occasions are attributable to struggle.
The individuals of Gaza celebrated the start of this struggle. Did they not know what would observe? And did you additionally not know?
And did you not know that Hamas’s said purpose is to destroy the state of Israel? And did you not know that if Hamas acted on this purpose it might convey struggle on Gaza?
And but despite realizing all this, you point out none of it in your article. As an alternative you counsel that Palestinians wish to stay in peace with their neighbors. However three quarters of Palestinians favored the Hamas invasion of Israel. Is that this your concept of peace?
Did you not know that Hamas has constructed lots of of miles of tunnels below your houses, hospitals and faculties? And but you surprise why Israel is bombing them.
If you’re all in favour of peace, don’t you suppose beginning place could be an sincere description of what has occurred between Israel and Gaza and to not fake that Gaza is an harmless sufferer of indiscriminate army aggression?
Robert Niederman
Chapel Hill, N.C.
To the Editor:
I applaud The New York Instances for publishing Yahya R. Sarraj’s neutral and earnest first-hand account of the horrific occasions unfolding in Gaza.
In accordance with the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, Israel has now hit the Gaza Strip with the equal of two nuclear bombs.
The loss of life toll has surpassed a staggering 21,000, of which greater than 8,000 are youngsters. Greater than 80 % of the inhabitants — about 1.9 million individuals — has been displaced.
In a media environment the place any Palestinian voice is unexpectedly silenced as antisemitic, I commend your journalistic integrity in bringing various viewpoints.
Asma Ahmad
Orange, Calif.
To the Editor:
Yahya R. Sarraj isn’t any harmless. His letter is eloquent in its exposition of how Gaza was wronged by Israel. And it’s tragic that his son has been killed.
However he and his group are accountable.
He’s a Hamas appointee. He’s a part of the group that conceived of and executed a horrific assault on Israel. He glosses over the assault. He fails to precise horror at or condemn what occurred in Israel and seeks to deflect accountability for the inhumane acts and fee of grotesque struggle crimes by Hamas. As an alternative he blames Israel.
He doesn’t criticize Hamas’s actions through the years since Israel left the Gaza Strip in 2005. Or the tunnel metropolis constructed to deal with weapons and conceal the Hamas militants. Or the diversion of sources to construct a corporation bent on destroying Israel. Or the firing of 1000’s of rockets into Israel.
Mr. Sarraj’s letter is pure, unadulterated propaganda. It’s supposed to provide legitimacy to Hamas, a genocidal, evil group and nothing extra.
Why publish it?
Jeremy Levin
New York
To the Editor:
I commend you for publishing Mayor Yahya R. Sarraj’s visitor essay, although you might get accused (unfairly for my part) of being pro-Hamas or antisemitic.
I believe it’s essential to your readers to start to get a really feel for the ache and destruction attributable to Israel’s counterattack following Hamas’s brutal assault on Oct. 7.
It’s essential for the world to see even simply this small sliver of the fact that the individuals in Gaza are struggling. It’s important that we get truthful, goal info from either side of this tragic battle and never suppress info just because it makes any person uncomfortable.
This can be a son of Holocaust survivors penning this.
Joseph Tein
Friday Harbor, Wash.
Putin Gained’t Profit From Western Enterprise Exits for Lengthy
Whereas it’s true that the Kremlin has subverted the rules governing enterprise exits to shore up its funds and political help within the quick time period, in doing so, it has damaged each investor legislation on the market.
With these expropriations, Russia will forgo Western investments and credit for the foreseeable future. Kremlin-style “waronomics” offers solely a really momentary and synthetic enhance. Vladimir Putin’s insurance policies now will significantly weaken Russia’s development prospects, even within the medium time period.
Companies are additionally not helpless bystanders; they’ve a selection. Fairly than look ahead to expropriation whereas working the intense and rising danger of complicity in Russia’s struggle crimes, they need to face their dilemma head-on.
The Russian authorities de facto already controls the assets of businesses that stay in Russia. That’s the reason firms have to make an moral and swift exit technique, based mostly on enhanced human rights and due-diligence processes that decrease advantages for the Russian state.
The place no credible sale choice exists, and within the face of clear and direct contributions to mass human hurt, firms ought to write down the loss and/or take the case to worldwide arbitration or search different authorized cures.
What are they ready for?
Tymofiy Mylovanov
Nataliia Shapoval
Eleanor Nichol
Mr. Mylovanov is Ukraine’s former minister of financial growth and the president of the Kyiv College of Economics. Ms. Shapoval is chair of the Kyiv College of Economics Institute. Ms. Nichol is the manager director of the B4Ukraine Coalition.
The Supreme Court docket’s Abortion Tablet Case
To the Editor:
Re “Supreme Court Plans to Hear Challenge to Abortion Pill Access” (information article, Dec. 14):
It’s scientifically and ethically absurd that our highest court docket will even contemplate that an “abortion tablet” was not sufficiently evaluated. Over 30 years in the past, I used to be a part of the staff that first introduced this treatment to the US from Europe, the place it had already been proven to be secure and efficient. The American Medical Affiliation agreed, with a coverage assertion I drafted. It nonetheless took the F.D.A. over 4 years to approve it — hardly a hasty course of.
Since then, huge analysis and medical expertise have confirmed its judgment. Our courts are presupposed to be above politics and to honor our constitutional separation of church and state.
A lot of the anti-choice activists difficult this treatment are avowedly “Christian.” That any court docket, not to mention the Supreme one, will even entertain their blatant disregard for medical science, ladies’s reproductive wants, our Structure and powerful American majority opinion is a nationwide embarrassment.
Steve Heilig
San Francisco
Pets and Social Media
To the Editor:
Re “My Year of Being Very Online About Dogs,” by Alicia P.Q. Wittmeyer and Mark Peckmezian (Opinion, Dec. 24):
I learn this piece to Idaho, my 11-year-old, 70-pound, typically well-behaved goldendoodle. We thereafter agreed to take care of our longstanding determination to keep away from all types of social media.
I discover these platforms basically vacuous, and since he lacks opposable thumbs, Idaho has hassle dealing with small digital gadgets.
Joseph D. McInerney
Lutherville, Md.