Not the path to peace

This action by the Palestine Liberation Organization is self-serving and dangerous, resulting in immediate funding cuts to UNESCO by the U.S. and Canada, as it should. [“UNESCO will grant Palestinians membership,” News, Nov. 1.]

Achieving peace and being recognized as a sovereign state is very difficult work. Months or years of negotiations, concessions and compromises from all parties are the only ways to achieve this goal, not unilateral declaration.

[Palestinian President Mahmoud] Abbas has refused to sit at the negotiation table with Israel, refused to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, refused to make concessions and refused to accept that Israel is the historical homeland of the Jewish people (as demonstrated in his U.N. speech). A U.N. resolution will not achieve peace or create a state for the Palestinian people. Only acceptance of Israel and face-to-face negotiations will achieve this end.

If the Palestinian leaders want a state for their people, then they must begin working with Israel to establish clear borders, and they must end the rocket and terrorist attacks inflicted on the people of Israel.

This government of Abbas does not have ruling power or recognition by the Hamas terrorist organization that rules the Gaza Strip. Abbas clearly stated that his state of Palestine would be free of Jews and that he does not recognize Israel as Jewish state. Is this the basis of a Palestinian state? Ethnic cleansing? Can the U.N. really back a leader who advocates this? Condemnations are more appropriate here, not acceptance and support.

— Iris Langman, Mercer Island