To The Editor:

It is not unusual to find harsh criticism of Israeli government policies published in The Arab American News.  But Mazin Qumsiyeh’s piece in the August 13th issue crossed the line into blatant stereotyping of Jews and should have been edited or excluded from the paper.  Ancient anti-Semitic canards of Jewish control of banking and of Jews as war profiteers were clearly apparent in Qumsiyeh’s writing.  Add to that his charge that Russian oligarchs (Jews are less than 1% of Russia’s population) have sheltered their ill-gotten gains in Israel, and his placing the word Israel in quotes – and there was no doubt that Qumsiyeh constructs a worldview in which global Jewry is a nemesis of peace and economic well-being.  Let us hope that Israelis and Palestinians can conduct peaceful negotiations toward a resolution of their conflict.  But Jews have a long history of suffering from unfair stereotyping and conspiracy charges.  Please don’t continue that tradition under the guise of Palestinian viewpoint in the pages of this newspaper.

Sincerely,

Allan Gale

Associate Director

Jewish Community Relations Council

of Metropolitan Detroit