"I recently read a letter on the [Letter's Page of The Daily Progress] declaring: "The next time we are attacked, the pacifists and leftists will deserve as much blame as the monsters who perpetrate it" ("Left only can hear its own voice," The Daily Progress, March 20). Yet the facts clearly suggest otherwise.

One of the largest agendas of the right-wing members of the government has been the continuing support of Israel, which currently receives more U.S. aid than any other country. yet the government's reluctance to sufficiently hold Israel responsible for its actions has been the center of the Arab world's resentment of the United States - a resentment that, among fundamentalist groups, has translated into the proliferation of terrorist organizations. So while members of the left clamor for the creation of a Palestinian state and more effective admonistions to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, the right simply overlooks Israel's human-rights violations and empowers the image of groups like al-Qaida among Muslims.

The Bush administration, also, has created significantly more enemies in the streets of the Middle East by its declaration of the 'axis of evil,' or nations President Bush perceives as a threat. So instead of increasing dialogue with these countries to slow their nuclear programs or better combat terrorist groups, he has essentially branded them as "terrorist states" whose citizens and government have no other political intention than destroying the United States.

While anti-U.S. demonstrations exploded throughout the Arab world over this, the left had simply been advocating one-on-one dipomacy, rather than making harsh accusations before an international audience. Now despite Bush's desire to improve relations with Iran and North Korea, the damage has already been done to the people of these nations. Bush's greatest wish is to destroy their way of life - a feeling that is, apparently, mutual.

If we, as a nation, have learned anything since 9/11, it's that terrorism stems from a great misunderstanding between the United States and the Muslim world. And these rifts are the result of shortsighted, belligerent Republican policies." (Henry Alexander Wiencek, Letters to the Editor, The Daily Progress, April 25, 2003)