Reply by Alan J. Nathanson
Comments sent directly to the Seattle Transit Authority are as follows :
Dear Ms. Thielke :
The decision of the Seattle, Washington transit authorities to accept viciously anti-Israeli Arab propaganda on your bus system is truly an outrage of staggering immorality. I am sure you will hear much concerning this ill-considered decision, both on the telephone and by e-mail, so I will not recite chapter and verse to you on the details of this atrocity your city is committing. Suffice it to say, whether you agree or not, Israel is a tiny democratic country fighting desperately for existence in an especially vicious part of the world.
To characterize that nation's defensive measures against almost daily bombardments and other provocations as "war crimes" reminds me of George Orwell's novel 1984 in which all true statements are turned on their heads to mean the precise opposite, i.e. "slavery is freedom", "war is peace", etc. I am certain you are an educated woman and clearly understand how George Orwell predicted how truths would be perverted into bald-faced lies in his fictional dystopia of the future. Well it certainly appears that Seattle has made a major step to advance this nightmarish prediction ! This immoral action on your city's part makes me ashamed to be required to admit that Seattle is part of the same country I hold dear.
The utter hypocrisy of accepting advertisements such as the ones that you plan for the Seattle bus system clearly proves to many Americans that the persons or organizations who are paying you the blood money for the ads, are a greater threat of violence should you not accept their ads than we Americans, both Christian, secular or Jewish, and other people of good-will who are deeply offended and insulted by the political pornography you propose to display so boldly. What an utter perversion of the concept of freedom of speech, you commit for a few dollars in revenue. To even consider the display of such inflammatory political lies is an unconscionable act of either your fear of the sponsors, or bias against those who are opposed to it.
Should Seattle see fit to proceed with this disgusting decision, I will gladly join and support any organization that will bring pressure on your city, either before or after the fact, by whatever means
necessary to bring the city back to the real world, perhaps through tourist boycotts or other peaceful actions.
It is with a deep sense of disgust that I am compelled to address you in this manner, but your Seattle civic authorities need a wake-up call to political reality ! Indeed, madam, what are you folks drinking
in your water out there!