LETTER: Unfounded umbrage

SL Shapiro’s umbrage at Business Day and Mia Swart is unwarranted (“Words carry meaning”, May 16).

Yes, certainly words have meaning, and Swart did not use the expression “From the river to the sea” frivolously or foolishly.

For Palestinians, whether Christian or Muslim, the expression “From the river to the sea” means the yearning for the fulfilment of justice. And this justice means freedom from genocide, domicide, arboricide, ethnic cleansing, apartheid, racism, arbitrary imprisonment, torture, humiliation, checkpoints, child abuse, evictions, theft of their land and water resources, and the implementation of UN General Assembly Resolution 194 of 1948, which called for the right of return for the expelled Palestinian refugees.

Surely these are not unreasonable Palestinian desires and no right-thinking person who believes in the promotion of a culture of human rights should have any objection to these legitimate aspirations, which Palestinians have been denied for decades.

Incidentally, SL Shapiro seems to be unaware that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s own Likud Party’s 1977 manifesto stated that “between the sea and the Jordan there will only be Israeli sovereignty”.

Gunvant Govindjee
Ormonde

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