Rehman's Picture Incomplete

To the editors:

Aamir Abdul Rehman's column, "Considering Palestine," sets out to move beyond the "superficial sense of the issues" and present "normative judgments and a sense of right and wrong" but unfortunately proceeds to offer a one-sided, and indeed superficial, accounting of Middle Eastern Politics.

Rehman mentions the United Nations' 1947 Partition Resolution, ostensibly to illustrate the long-term incongruity between Israel's actions and the wishes of the international community. Rehman fails to mention that the Jewish population in 1947 accepted this partition plan, and that the plan did not come to fruition because it was rejected by the Arab population and neighboring Arab nations.

Rehman continues to present U.N. resolutions condemning Israel under the assumption that the U.N. offers an impartial, reliable perspective on Israeli policy when in fact the body remains tainted by the infamous resolution passed in 1975 equating Zionism with racism. While the U.N. repealed this resolution nearly two decades later, should one not regard the United Nations with wary eye in this arena?

On the subject of human rights, Rehman likewise applies selective judgement. In this effort to apply "fundamental questions of justice," Rehman makes no mention of widespread human rights abuses perpetrated by the Palestinian Authority. Rehman correctly points out that human rights remain an international concern; it is for this reason that his highly selective condemnation is especially troubling, as it skews this terrible and complex conflict by portraying the issues in black and white, in terms of perpetrator and victim.

A reasonable assessment of this conflict must take into account the foibles, challenges, aspirations and dreams of both peoples; only with this fuller perspective can one hope to move forward towards consensus and, we hope, peace. BENJAMIN LEBWOHL '99   RUSTIN C. SILVERSTEIN '99   May 5, 1998

The writers are co-chairs of Harvard Students for Israel.