To: Editor of The Berkeley Daily Planet <opinion@berkeleydailyplanet.com>
The two side-by-side commentaries in Tuesday's Planet certainly caught my eye. The first one had a rather provocative title: "Criticizing Israel = Anti-Semitism", by Howard Glickman of Berkeley. I've never heard anyone actually make that equation, but I've certainly heard people accuse Israel's supporters of making it. Had the Planet actually found someone willing to equate criticizing Israel with hating the Jews?
I read the article. Then I read the article again. Then I read the article very carefully a third time. Then I went to the Planet's web site, downloaded the text of the article, and searched it for the strings "jew" and "semit". Those strings do not appear anywhere in the article, and I don't see the author in any way making the equation alleged in the title.
I'm curious, where did the title of the article come from? Is that what the author called it, or was the title added by someone at the Planet? If the latter, that person might want to consider a career other than journalism.
After puzzling over that for a while, I went on to the second commentary piece entitled "Zionist Crimes in Lebanon", by Kurosh Arianpour of Iran. That one was less interesting, but I thought I'd quote from it:
Also, one can ask why Jews had problem with Egyptians, with Jesus, with Europeans, and in modern times with Germans? The answer, among other things, is their racist attitude that they are the Chosen People. Because of this attitude, they do wrong to other people to the point that others turn against them, namely, become anti-Semite if you will.It is a mystery why the Planet thought this clumsy propaganda was worthy of publication. Was it to remind us that there are many people in this world with an irrational hatred of Jews? Thanks, but we already knew that.
Jef Poskanzer, Berkeley