Don't sentence Israel to death

The sight of people crammed into bomb shelters, waiting for the scream of the rocket to pass overhead and praying their country's military defence systems hold strong, is now an everyday occurence in Israel. Yet there are currently active campaigns to weaken those very defences keeping these families alive day after day.

A current petition asking the Prime Minister to stop the sales of British-made weapon-parts to Israel has cited the controversial Sayeeda Warsi who called the British policy on the Gaza crisis "morally indefensible".

Yet there can be little more morally indefensible than an attempt to withold Israel's means to defend itself against a barrage of rocket attacks from a terrorist organisation with one clear aim - to destroy Israel and kill the entire Jewish population. There are claims that the anti-Israel petition to which we object was sent to over one million people in an email which opens with an evocative description of "men, women and innocent children being killed, injured and driven from their homes" at the hands of Israel.

The deaths of so many civilians in Gaza is tragic and heartbreaking. But there is incontrovertible evidence to show that the innocent casualties would have been greatly reduced had Hamas not repeatedly used Palestinian children and civilians as human shields. It is widely accepted that Hamas is using schools and hospitals as rocket launch sites, and there is clear evidence to show that well over a hundred of Hamas' rockets have misfired and landed within Gaza. There is also absolute proof that Israel routinely warns civilians in Gaza ahead of any military attack on the area, by leaflet and telephone. There can be no doubt that responsibility for a great many unnecessary deaths rests within Gaza itself.

The petition to which we object has cherry-picked messages only from anti-Israel politicians, like the very worst of the biased, propagandist media. There are many other politicians and respected figures who have spoken up in public support of Israel and who could equally be cited. Ex-Prime Minister and Peace Envoy to the Middle East, Tony Blair said: "If 80 rockets would be fired upon the citizens of Great Britain, no way I wouldn't be taking action. If an Israeli prime minister would fail to take action, people would say that this is unacceptable".

What do you think would happen if Israel's weapons were blocked? What would happen if they lost their means to defend themselves from terrorists firing rockets into their country and tunnelling into their towns for the sole purpose of killing as many Israelis as possible? The death count in the Middle East would not be reduced. It would increase. But it would be Israelis dying. Jews instead of Arabs. The frightening and difficult question is whether Jewish deaths seem to be more acceptable to some than Arab deaths.

The number of innocent people in Gaza who have been killed is sad and terrible. But the unequal comparison of numbers of Arab deaths versus numbers of Israeli deaths is being manipulated into an indicator of victim versus aggressor. In fact the only reason more Israelis haven't been killed is because of Israel's Iron Dome defence system, which shoots rockets out of the sky. Without their sophisticated defences a huge number of Israelis would have been killed in this current conflict. The frightening fact is that it seems a great many people would be happier if the Israeli death count were in the hundreds or thousands too.

Over recent weeks there has been a sharp rise in open and violent anti-semitism across Europe and the rest of the world. This is the issue that campaigning organisations should be tackling. When they choose instead to add fuel to an already out-of-control fire, spreading half-truths and prejudice and adding to the anti-Israel and anti-semitic propaganda filling our newspapers and inboxes, they are contributing to an already volatile and dangerous situation.

We therefore urge the Prime Minister to disregard the petition calling for him to withdraw support from Israel. If David Cameron bows to pressure to stop the sale of weapons-parts to Israel, he will be denying the right of the only democratic state in the Middle East to defend itself from terrorist attack.

In the words of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: "If the Arabs put down their weapons today, there would be no more violence. If the Jews put down their weapons today, there would be no more Israel."

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Any anti-semitic or threatening emails received will be forwarded to the police as appropriate.