The faces of Israeli democracy. The demonstrators on the right
oppose Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's planned withdrawal from Gaza and dismantling of Jewish
settlements. The demonstrators on the left, who gathered on March 19 under the leadership of
Shalom Achshav, Israel's Peace Now movement, support the government's plan for
disengagement and want to give the Palestinians' pragmatic new leader, Mahmoud Abbas, a chance to
work toward peace.
The choices are stark. Continued occupation of a large and
growing Palestinian population, as the Settler Movement proposes, or negotiations with a rational,
pragmatic Palestinian leadership, with security for Israel, as Shalom Achshav advocates
and 70% of Israelis support.
The stakes are high. Prime Minister Sharon is doing everything
he can to see that Israel exits Gaza. But settler leaders and their allies are fighting to stop
Sharon's plan. Well-funded and relying on a huge army of volunteers, they have gone beyond
organizing legitimate protests: they have compared evacuating settlements to the Holocaust, issued
rabbinical rulings against removing settlements, and threatened a civil war. When Israeli soldiers
recently tried to remove two trailers from an outpost in the West Bank, they were met by hundreds
of angry settlers. One settler even cocked his gun and pointed it at the head of a soldier. Death
threats against cabinet ministers and their families have multiplied by the day. And these
fanatical settlers haven't stopped at threatening live targets - Prime Minister Sharon has had to
protect the grave of his late wife, Lily, from threatened desecration by these extremists.
The goal is clear. As the sister organization of Shalom
Achshav, Americans for Peace Now provides a majority of the funds that Peace Now in Israel
uses for its activities. Our support is crucial to counter the right-wing American Jews and
Evangelicals who help finance the settler movement. We ask for your help. The choice is between
continued occupation or using every available opening to forge a negotiated settlement with the
Palestinians, leading to security for Israel.
Is there really a choice?
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