I would like to appeal to my colleague Ainsley Henriques to use his office and his organisation to request of the government of Israel that it recalls the history of its people in the Warsaw ghettos during the period of the Nazis, and to see the similarities to the massacre now being meted out on the Palestinian people in Gaza.

When Israel occupied Palestine in 1948, the Palestinians were driven out of the homeland and dispersed to the four corners of the earth, and those who remained in the occupied territories were constantly abused, humiliated and denied all basic human rights.

Nelson Mandela who suffered under the heads of oppression once said that "Our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians".

Selfish purpose

We must all unite to put pressure on the Israeli government to desist from this ethnic cleansing for their selfish purpose to occupy lands.

What we now see unfolding is a humanitarian crisis in Gaza. I refer to an article in the Jordan Times where UN officials were cautioned that "The children of Gaza, the dead and the barley living... their mothers...... their father are not collateral damage. Their lives do matter; their losses do count. They are not divisible from our universal humanity - no child is, no civilian is."

I would like to remind Henriques that there can be no peace without justice.

I am, etc.,

JOSEPH G HANDAL

Kingston