Sir, – Brian Ó Éigeartaigh claims that the driver for the world-wide singling out of Israel is its alleged immunity from economic sanctions for supposed human rights abuses (Letters, March 12th).
However, Turkey, a member of the EU’s customs union, enjoys immunity from economic sanctions even though it has brutally suppressed the Kurds for most of the last 100 years. Turkey also illegally occupies parts of Cyprus since it invaded the island in 1974.
According to the Cyprus ministry of foreign affairs, Turkish forces and their associates have vandalised or destroyed some 550 Greek Orthodox churches, monasteries, etc, in the occupied area even though the intentional destruction of cultural heritage is considered a war crime by Unesco.
Yet where is the outrage against Turkey and similar repressive states?
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During 2018, the UN General Assembly passed 21 resolutions condemning Israel, and a mere six for the rest of the world.
One of the 21 anti-Israel resolutions even condemned Israel for “repressive measures” against the Syrian people, even though the UN itself has largely failed to punish Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad for gassing, starving and murdering his own people.
This strange, disproportionate focus on Israel is found here as well. In December 2018 NGO Monitor, an Israeli NGO, calculated that Trócaire’s website trócaire.org mentioned Israel 193 times, war-ravaged Yemen 62 times, Saudi Arabia 26 times and the Rohingya just 41 times. – Yours, etc,
KARL
MARTIN,
Bayside,
Dublin 13.