Dear Editor:

It's clear that Rashid Khalidi's real problem is the fact that, after a break of nearly 2,000 years, Jerusalem is again the capital of a sovereign Jewish state. That being the case, his real beef should be not with Israel, but with his Arab brethren who rejected the United Nations Partition Plan, accepted by the Zionist leadership, which would have turned Jerusalem and its surroundings, including Bethlehem, into an international city.

One can't go back in time and it would be insane to go back to the situation we had after Jordan divided Jerusalem, kicked out all the Jews living in the Jewish Quarter, destroyed all its synagogues, neglected the Temple Mount and hardly anyone used Al Aksa Mosque.

It was poetic justice that Jordan's attacking Israel in 1967 from the Old City led to the entire, reunified city of Jerusalem again serving as the capital of the Jewish state.

And somehow I suspect Khalidi wouldn't be pretending the United States was building on "stolen Palestinian land" if it was perversely building a consulate to serve the Palestinian Authority in Israel's capital.

Sincerely,

Alan Stein