Avoiding destruction of the state of Israel

Try as Emily O' Sullivan (letters, Jul 10) might to smear the Israeli Deputy Ambassador in Dublin, one thing is for certain, the Israeli government and people have officially recognised the Palestinians' right to have their own state.

One cannot, regrettably, see any comparable shift in Palestinian opinion recognising Israel as the state of the Jewish people. Polls show that most Palestinians are unwilling to give up the 'right of return' for Palestinian refugees. Flooding Israel with four million of their descendants would effectively mean the destruction of Israel by demographic means.

In their concern for Palestinians, the Emily O'Sullivans of this world wilfully ignore the existence of Jewish refugees expelled from Arab states with nothing but the shirts on their backs. These Jews now constitute half the Jews of Israel but have never received recognition nor compensation.