To the editors:

The blame that David M. DeBartolo places on America and Israel in “Terrorists Are Made, Not Born” (Opinion, Oct. 23) for the current international crisis is appalling. Making the terrorism of the Palestinians an afterthought, DeBartolo laments that America has not put more pressure on Israel to recognize a Palestinian state.

If we can learn anything from the Sept. 11 attacks, it is the danger that governments run by extremists poses to the international community. A Palestinian government would surely be run by the body currently known as the Palestinian Authority—a group that not only continues to harbor terrorists of Hamas and Hizbollah, but runs a terrorist organization of its own called Fatah. America should do nothing in the way of seeing that a Palestinian state is formed until it is certain that the Palestinian terrorist organizations are handed over and brought to justice, and that extremist interests do not prevail in the Palestinian government. Without these measures, true peace in both the Middle East and the world will never prevail.

Eric Trager ’05

Oct. 23, 2001