Feedback
Time to speak
the truth
Regarding Val Torrens’ latest biased diatribe titled, “Jimmy Carter’s discussions with Hamas are questionable,” (CK Reporter, May 14). It is high time to speak the truth about Israel’s motives and actions in the Middle East.
It is hard to show “sensitivity” and “understanding” toward a nation whose leaders reflect the attitude emblazoned on the lintel of the building housing the Knesset (Jewish Congress) to wit: “Remember to show no mercy to a non-Jew. If a non-Jew falls into a ditch, hurry and find a rock with which to cover him so that he can’t escape.”
Every Israeli leader from Ben Gurion to the present holds to this Talmudic philosophy. The result has been the Israelis bulldozing of homes (with the occupants still in them), running over children and unarmed civilians with tanks, shooting down unarmed civilians, including shooting babies in the head like wild dogs and shooting unarmed Egyptian soldiers AFTER they had already surrendered. These are “war crimes” that Israel has never acknowledged, despite the repeated protestations of the UN.
Palestinians do not have the luxury of tanks, planes and rifles. When they use the only weapons available, such as a suicide bomber in a truck full of explosives, they are labeled fanatical “terrorists.”
“Peaceful” Israel does not want peace in the Middle East. Ben Gurion himself, and every Israeli leader since, has publicly stated that Israel’s agenda is the conquest of the entire Middle East and the Arabs be damned. Our sanitized news media (owned largely by Jews) never, but never, gives a true account of events in the Middle East.
Don’t forget that Ariel Sharon and his thugs killed and mutilated British soldiers and blew up hotels to get what they wanted. Now that the Hamas and Palestinians are justifiably giving them a dose of their own medicine they whine “terrorism.”
MIKE EGGERT
Bremerton
Thank you
Fund-raiser
a success
Brownsville PTSA would like to recognize and thank Roadhouse Nursery and Home Depot for sponsoring our annual Spring Plant Sale. Every year Roadhouse Nursery provides plants and Home Depot furnishes plant boxes for this successful school fund-raiser. Dollars raised will support classroom technology, playground equipment and parent education. It is businesses like these that make an amazing difference in the life of a child!
KIM WASHBURN
Brownsville PTSA-Plant Sale coordinator
Illahee Outfall
A sad day
for Kitsap County
We would like to respond to the decision by Kitsap County Commissioners Bauer and Angel to reject the Illahee Community Club’s appeal regarding the Illahee Outfall and the placement of a 42-inch diameter outfall on a public beach (Commissioner Brown supported our appeal).
The Community Club contemplated the expense of an appeal and decided it had no choice as some crucial items were ignored by the hearing examiner.
The community is primarily concerned with locating the outfall directly under our public fishing and swimming dock located on Port Orchard Bay.
The community area is extremely small (50-100 feet wide) and used for shellfishing, swimming, scuba diving, etc.
We are concerned about water quality because rain washes pollutants (whatever is upland and along the roadway) directly to the outfall and beach. We presented those concerns and also highlighted the differences between the current (2005) Dept. of Ecology stormwater manual and the county’s use of the 1992 Ecology manual. Despite county staff testimony given during the appeal, increased stormwater treatments are required by the latest Ecology manual to further reduce pollutants.
But those treatment concerns have sidetracked the critical issue, which is the public health issue of locating an outfall on a public beach used for swimming and shellfish harvesting.
The county did not, we repeat, did not, look at the public health issues of the outfall. The county’s health technician looked only at drinking water and sewer requirements for lots.
Public health is the “long pole in the tent.” It is the major and overriding issue for the Illahee community. We explained this to the hearing examiner and in our appeal, but no one seems to get it.
We feel county staff, who know the review limits, are less than forthright in explaining them; it appears they are more interested in “winning” than in doing the right thing. We think even the hearing examiner got duped into thinking the health department approved all aspects of the project.
Who loses with this decision? Kitsap County citizens, the Illahee community, the waters of Puget Sound, the children swimming at the dock and the shellfish gatherers. In other words, the very citizens the commissioners and county staff are supposed to represent and protect.
It is a sad day for Kitsap County residents and another sad day for those in Illahee.
JAMES AHO
The Illahee Community Club
Board representative
Bremerton
