Hear All Sides: Middle East

UN pressure, including at least an arms embargo, must be put on the Israelis to withdraw from the occupied territories and to pull out the illegal settlers. Most reasonable people on both sides of this dispute accept that this now offers the only hope for peace. It is a solution which has been persistently sabotaged by successive Israeli governments, goaded by Zionist extremists on the one hand, and by Islamist extremists on the other, who step up their despicable suicide bombings whenever compromise seems possible.

They are motivated more by hatred than desperation, but they rely upon the hopeless and the desperate for their supporters and their suicidal recruits. Justice for the Palestinians would disempower them, and also bring security for Israel.

It would also undermine support for Saddam Hussein by depriving him of his ludicrous claim to be the champion of the Palestinians, and of Arabs and Muslims generally, and by demonstrating that the UN can apply the principles of justice and human rights impartially. - P Winstanley, Durham.

BALI BOMBING

APPARENTLY, the Australian government has been told by sources in Indonesia to advise its citizens to leave the country.

I wonder why this should be. Then I began to think about the despicable treatment by Australia of asylum seekers from Indonesia.

I am absolutely amazed that our media have not made the connection. Then again why be surprised when they turn a blind eye to many incidents which could embarrass our "allies".

Many Australians were ashamed at what the Howard administration did in their name and surely some must be thinking this is the bitter harvest. - H Pender, Darlington.

GUY FAWKES

RAY Mallon (Echo, Oct 18) describes Guy Fawkes as a terrorist, but is this description correct?

We are constantly told that Guy Fawkes' actions were an attack against democracy. This is a lie. In 1605 Parliament was composed entirely of unelected people led by the unelected religious fanatic James I, in which only those of noble birth or sufficient wealth could have political representation and any form of legal, civil or human rights.

In effect, Guy Fawkes was a terrorist because he tried to destroy a brutal dictatorship, led by a religious fanatic who used policies of religious, cultural and racial genocide against his own population and those of other nations.

But are not these the same reasons behind the West's war on terrorism? - CT Riley, Spennymoor.

REGIONAL GOVERNMENT

WHEN it comes to hearing all sides of the debate on devolution for England, there is only one point of view expressed by politicians and media alike.

That is the policy of regional assemblies. These are discussed as if they are inevitable.

If regional assemblies are inevitable it is only because they have been the only cards on the table. No other alternatives, such as a Parliament for England, have ever been discussed.

The people of England have not, nationwide, been given the opportunities of full public debate, followed by consultation and had our consent sought through referendum on the way our nation is to be governed in the future.

This contrasts starkly with the treatment the people of Scotland received before the Scottish Parliament was established in 1999.

There has not been, to date, one single supporter of regional assemblies who can state what legislative powers they will have (if any). What tax raising or lowering powers they will have (if any) or whether they will have the same rights and privileges enjoyed by the Scottish Parliament. The only thing that RAs can promise is a lack of local accountability and representation and a massive, expensive and self-proliferating bureaucracy, designed solely to implement the policies of Central Government in Westminster. - Colin Ray (Member of The Campaign for an English Parliament), Harwell, Essex.

BRIAN RIX

WHAT wonderful memories Mike Amos brought back in his Gadfly column (Echo, Oct 16) when he recalled the days when Brian Rix reduced audiences to tears of laughter with his Whitehall farces.

Baron Rix, as he is now, deserves to be acclaimed for the joy he brought to so many people through his stage performances, and even more so for the many years of quiet, non-self publicity seeking work he does for mentally-handicapped people, the cause to which he has dedicated his life. - EA Moralee, Billingham.

EUROPE

FOR anyone trying to deny what the European Union is intent on becoming, we need simply to heed the words of former French president Valery Giscard D'Estaing, now President of the Convention on the Future of Europe. He revealed he wants to rename the EU the "United States of Europe".

This is to be the new Soviet Union, built by a self-serving political elite without the democratic mandate from any of the peoples across Europe and with its own currency, bank, flag, anthem, army, parliament, police force, courts, judicial system and, before long, its own constitution.

Unless this train is derailed, the wars of secession in Europe may be very bloody indeed.

It is time we had a referendum across the whole of the EU as to whether the people of the member states actually want to be part of this one nation.

This is not alarmist talk from someone with any vested interest. This is simply from a former market trader who was forced to find out how the whole situation in which he had become embroiled had actually been allowed to happen. - Neil Herron, Metric Martyrs Defence Fund, Sunderland.