The facts are on our side

Further to the ongoing arguments with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and his associates (“Netanyahu: Abbas speech shows Palestinians don’t want peace,” January 16), I find it amazing that we do not stop this futility and once and for all confirm to the world that the modern State of Israel was founded on the irrefutable testimony not of the Jewish people, but the nations of the world.

We must react only with the following to hostile arguments:

• In Luke 2:46, we read that Jesus debated with the doctors [rabbis ] in the Temple. Every practicing Christian is aware of this, but possibly some reminding would not be out of place.

In Rome, there exists an 1,800-year-old monument recording in writing and illustration the destruction of a people, Jerusalem and its Temple. The Arch of Titus has been and is seen by millions who might need a reminder that this vanquished people has been reborn in its ancient homeland.

• In 1922, the League of Nations, by a vote of 52-0, agreed to the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people “whereas recognition has hereby been given to the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country.”

• In November 1947, the United Nations, by a vote of 33 to 13, with 10 abstentions, confirmed a much-reduced area for the establishment of a Jewish state.

• Palestine was not part of any Arab state or country but, prior to British control, was a part of the Ottoman empire, which was dismantled after World War I and divided into independent Arab states.

It is quite clear that Israel was not founded by any Jewish conquest or aggression, but by the logical action of the gentile states of the world well before the horrors of the Holocaust could be imagined. It is most disconcerting and costly in life and energy that our successive authorities have not made an effort to disseminate these historical facts to at least the non-Muslim countries of the world. BERNHARD LAZARUS

Tel Aviv

The hysteria emanating from Mahmoud Abbas, leader of the terror-sponsoring Palestinian Authority, is laughable. As he always does – and must continue to do – just to survive, Abbas is playing to his base and to the go-along-with-anything-against-Israel media.

Israelis need to stop saying it’s about time that someone such as President Donald Trump tells Abbas about the harsh reality of the situation. It’s time for Netanyahu to tell Abbas, the PA, Hamas, Europe and the rest of the world the truth: An undivided Jerusalem is Israel’s forever, and if you want any semblance of a functioning Palestinian entity, keep quiet, stop the incitement, end the support for terrorists and begin the long road toward educating your people to accept the fact of a Jewish state that could actually benefit all lives in the region. ALLAN KANDEL

Los Angeles

Mahmoud Abbas’s politics – rejection, negation, delegitimization of a Jewish connection to the area – is presented as despair. Despair it is, indeed, over the loss of his unconditional supporter in the White House and the dawn of the new era in Middle Eastern and world history – the Trump’s era.

Despair it is indeed that his dream of destroying the Jewish state and the Jews hasn’t come true (and never will since the Almighty stated otherwise). Yasser Arafat’s devoted follower and ideological heir is unwilling to change, whether by granting him financial incentives or diplomatic support, or denying or reducing them. PETER ROTBERG Ramle