WITH reference to Colin Cowan’s article ("Shame on them: SNP used the murder of my brother as a cynical photo op") and your front page story ("Brother of Hamas victim blasts 'antisemitic' SNP") today (August 21), I have a few observations to make. Whilst one can understand the dismay and anger felt by Mr Cowan about the death of his brother and many innocent civilians in Hamas’s despicable actions on October 8, he does himself no favours by the nature of his article. His attack on Humza Yousaf as participating in “Jew washing” is vile.
Can I remind Mr Cowan that Mr Yousaf’s parents-in-law were trapped in Gaza as a result of military action by Israel and that his family still has relatives living there? He claims that Israel is a democracy. Israel’s Nation State Law , passed in 2018, says: “The right to exercise national self-determination in the State of Israel is unique to the Jewish people.” That is a clear definition of an apartheid state that disregards the aspirations of non-Jewish Israeli citizens.
He repeats the allegation, made by Israel with no evidence whatsoever, that a United Nations agency directly supported the massacre on October 8. This is a lie and has been exposed as such. Despite the Israeli Defence Force killing more than 40,000 Palestinians, injuring close to 100,000, destroying 50% of homes and 80% of non-residential properties and displacing around two million Palestinian civilians, he offers no words of sympathy or regret to Palestinian.