To the editor:
Re Rachel Kushner's article, "We are orphans here," besides a number of factual errors, such as repeated references to "East Jerusalem" even though no such place exists, I found it amazing that Kushner completely ignored the elephant in the room.
Of course, refugee camps are awful places. But why, 68 years after 6 Arab armies invaded Israel in an attempt to destroy that tiny democracy a day after its re-establishment, is the United Nations still running refugee camps for the children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of the Arabs who left their homes so long ago?
Why, when all other refugees are integrated into the communities to which they moved, are the descendants of the Arab refugees still kept separate, in Jordan, in Lebanon, in Syria and even in the Palestinian Authority itself? Why has the Palestinian Authority not closed a single refugee camp in the two decades it has been responsible for more than 95 percent of the Arabs in the disputed territories?
And why have the leaders of the Palestinian Arabs repeatedly rejected offers that would have given them their own state and the help of the entire world in ending the tragedy the Arab world brought on all those families?
Sincerely,
Alan Stein