Wednesday, Jul 9, 2008
Kosovar refugees aren't like Palestinians; mommies worry because they like it.
Apr 22, 1999 | Miss Israel visits the Balkans
BY FLORE DE PRENEUF
(04/15/99)
The snide tone of the recent article by Flore de Preneuf regarding Israel's efforts to aid Kosovar refugees was entirely inappropriate. Israel's motives for doing the simplest of things are always being impugned by people who assume that Israel always has ulterior motives for doing anything, aiding refugees in particular. They're damned if they do and damned if they don't. If they sit on their hands, they're accused of ignoring the plight of the refugees because they're Muslims. If they actually help them, they're sniggered at by smug nihilists who think the whole thing is nothing but a dishonest publicity stunt, concocted to suck up to public opinion.
The situations of the Kosovars and the Palestinians are not in any way analogous. While it is unfortunate, and while an equitable solution is greatly to be hoped for, the plight of the Palestinian Arab refugees is most definitely not the fault of Israel, as much as the article tries to insinuate this. The Palestinians were displaced as a result of a series of wars against Israel instigated by the Arabs, the stated purpose of which was the destruction of Israel. Ever since the PLO was founded by the Arab League (prior to the 1967 war, I might add), the Palestinian Arabs have gone out of their way to let everyone know that they wholeheartedly supported the PLO program, which, until very recently, explicitly called for the destruction of Israel by violence and the forcible banishment of most of the Jews who live there. Indeed, if Arafat's continuing statements to Arab-language media are any indication, the PLO has not yet genuinely repudiated this aim, regardless of the agreements they into which they have entered. The Palestinian refugee camps were created and maintained by the Arabs for the specific purpose of preventing Palestinian integration into the surrounding Arab countries -- keeping the eyes of the world focused on a problem that they made no effort to solve, and insuring that there would be a steady supply of desperate and violent people to fill the ranks of the fedayeen. Unfortunately, this strategy has worked only too well, aided and abetted by irresponsible journalists like de Preneuf.
The Kosovars, on the other hand, are genuine civilian victims of a planned campaign of genocide, who have never threatened Israel with war and destruction. It is only right to help them.
-- Earl Hartman
Damned to diaper duty
BY JENNIFER BINGHAM HULL
(04/16/99)
This was undoubtedly the worst piece of writing I have seen in Salon. Hull finally admits the truth near the end of page 2: "I say I want help but I also want control, of all these little things I care about and he doesn't." Nowhere in the article does she mention talking to her husband about the things that bother her, and why would she? He doesn't care, and she is not shy about proclaiming her assumptions as fact.
I would not deny that the father-child bond is much different than the mother-child bond, but as a father who told his wife to finish dressing while I changed and dressed my baby daughter in the outfit that I had selected; as a father who checked diapers, ointments and baby food in the morning and brought the replenishments home at night; and as a father who inspired laughter more than once when the pacifier or a tiny toy fell from a pocket at work, I would like to suggest that Hull take her passive-aggressive arrogance and toss it in the diaper pail, before her husband goes from passive to aggressive and leaves her to experience single motherhood. Then she can really whine.
-- Andy House
I don't know about her husband, but Jennifer Hull certainly sounds like a shrew. Consider this possibility: You worry because you like it, not because it matters. He doesn't like it, and so worries only about things that matter. Women have a lot invested in saying that men don't do enough. I've seen plenty of women say that in cases where it clearly isn't true: where the woman is a whining layabout while the husband cooks, cleans and entertains the kids. And even where it's true, it's often true because the woman is worrying for the sake of worrying. So you stayed up all night worrying about wipe warmers? Maybe the father just thinks kids need to get used to the idea that sometimes in life, your ass is cold. Women often value worry for its own sake; men mostly value results. Perhaps that's the real difference.
-- Glenn H. Reynolds
Get Salon in your mailbox!