Sample letter to the Editor

Dear __________

I am writing to express my outrage over Israel's construction of a Separation and Apartheid Wall in the Occupied Territories of Palestine. Key facts about this Wall must be made public. The Wall is being built entirely on Palestinian land, on the Palestinian side of the Green Line (since 1967, the internationally recognized border between Israel and the Occupied Territories of Palestine). The Wall is a massive project with trenches, barbed wire, sensors, and security roads. All Palestinian property between 60-100 meters on either side of the Wall is destroyed to make the Wall. In the Wall's first phase, over 100,000 Palestinian olive trees have been destroyed. Olives and olive oil are the backbone of the Palestinian agricultural economy. Furthermore, in the Wall's first phase, Israel has destroyed over 35,000 meters of water pipes, and over 20,000 Palestinian people have been separated from their agricultural lands, which have been annexed by Israel.

This Wall is a political move, not a security decision. While Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon assures the world publicly that the Wall will have minimal infringement on Palestinian life, in reality the opposite is true. Thousands of Palestinians can now barely move outside their villages; dozens of new checkpoints have been created since the Wall's first phase was completed. Over a dozen villages are now trapped between the wall and the Green Line. The Israeli government does not plan, however, to grant the residents of these villages Israeli citizenship. The construction of the Wall is in breach of International Law and Conventions to which Israel is a formal signatory, including the Geneva Conventions and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. These laws arose out of the atrocities of World War II, so that the world community would never again allow such crimes against humanity to happen. We must stop them from happening now in Palestine by stopping the Wall.