Whanganui Chronicle
  • Whanganui Chronicle home
  • Latest news
  • Sport
  • Business
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Property
  • Death notices
  • Classifieds

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • On The Up
  • Sport
  • Business
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Residential property listings
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology

Locations

  • Taranaki
  • National Park
  • Whakapapa
  • Ohakune
  • Raetihi
  • Taihape
  • Marton
  • Feilding
  • Palmerston North

Media

  • Video
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-Editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

Weather

  • New Plymouth
  • Whanganui
  • Palmertson North
  • Levin

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / Whanganui Chronicle

Your views: Readers' letters

Whanganui Chronicle
1 Feb, 2017 04:30 PM3 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

Israel situation

I like recent comments in the Wanganui Chronicle.

I have little confidence in Murray McCully. New Zealand has nothing to offer. Nor will I accept any "solution" that requires the extermination of 6 million Jews.

Jews still flee to Israel to escape persecution. Most come from western Ukraine. The second-largest influx is from France, where the government fails to protect Jews from both Muslims and Nazis.

The US forced the "Two State Solution" and Yasser Arafat on Israel and the Palestinians, who hated Arafat and his brutal, bloody rule.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

North-south borders between Israel, Palestine and Jordan cut across Palestinian clans. Israel's original plan was a commonwealth with open borders to reunite families, raise living standards in Palestine and Jordan and empty refugee camps. Jordan rejected this.

The wall and checkpoints are necessary evils. Land is scarce and Israeli authorities are overbearing.

However, Israeli Muslims vote and are generally content, Bedouin prefer Israeli rule over rule by Egypt, Fatah or Hamas, Israeli factories in the West Bank employ Palestinians at the same pay as Israelis, and Palestinians (and Gaza people) have generous free access to Israeli hospitals.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Fake news, boycotts, sanctions, and interference from UN, US, EU, Iran and NZ will not bring peace.

ALAN DAVIDSON
Gonville

Faith bias

How does Russ Hay's agnosticism have any effect on my faith (letters, January 21)? How does my use of the term "faith" in any way constitute an "abrogation", much less a determination, of what faith is?

Since the accusation that my God has "a penchant for brutal punishments, ethnic cleansing and genocide" is evidence of atheistic antipathy, a wilful misreading of scripture, side-stepping the accusation and addressing the bias was pertinent to the original point; atheism is a faith position and the constant antipathy toward God in discussions about him is evidence of bias.

Atheism ain't (and Russ ain't) neutral and empiricism is but its mask. My faith is not germane to that point, and the taunts of Russ I take to be mere evasions.

I never sought to justify my faith at all, either by logic or reason; that is the constant refrain, though, of the God denier. What I did say is that there is more logic in creation by a supreme being who is not bound up in or subject to matter than there is in the "unscientific" fantasy that stuff made itself out of nothing.

That too suggests an antipathy toward God, a resolve to commit to the unreasonable rather than take God at his word.

JOHN HAAKMA
Whanganui

Belief systems

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

I reply to Paul Evans (letters, January 17), who writes of God as the energy behind the creation of the universe.

Energy is something possessed by something or someone else. So I suggest we can think of God as the possessor of all the energy behind all of nature. Naturally we must live in tune with nature or we quickly come to grief.

Consider the Ten Commandments that Moses brought down from Mt Sinai about 1300BC. They are a pretty good guide for life.

And Jesus, who was Jewish, expounded them, offering people wracked by fear, guilt, hostility and inferiority another FGHI -- forgiveness, guidance, hope and inspiration.

TOM PITTAMS
Whanganui

Save

    Share this article

Latest from Whanganui Chronicle

Whanganui Chronicle

Earthquakes every six to seven minutes detected under Mt Ruapehu

08 Jul 10:48 PM
Whanganui Chronicle

'Serious shortcomings' in pilot academy management and systems - authority

08 Jul 06:00 PM
Whanganui Chronicle

Health NZ stops funds for Fit for Surgery programme

08 Jul 05:01 PM

From early mornings to easy living

sponsored
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Recommended for you
Armed police cordon off Hamilton street after serious firearms incident
New Zealand

Armed police cordon off Hamilton street after serious firearms incident

09 Jul 11:42 AM
Red Bull parts ways with longtime F1 boss Christian Horner
Sport

Red Bull parts ways with longtime F1 boss Christian Horner

09 Jul 10:00 AM
Against the odds: Maroons triumph in epic State of Origin decider
Rugby League

Against the odds: Maroons triumph in epic State of Origin decider

09 Jul 09:30 AM
Jacinda Ardern says she'll provide evidence to Covid Royal Commission
Politics

Jacinda Ardern says she'll provide evidence to Covid Royal Commission

09 Jul 08:35 AM
Lotto numbers revealed in giant $10m Powerball draw
New Zealand

Lotto numbers revealed in giant $10m Powerball draw

09 Jul 08:32 AM

Latest from Whanganui Chronicle

Earthquakes every six to seven minutes detected under Mt Ruapehu

Earthquakes every six to seven minutes detected under Mt Ruapehu

08 Jul 10:48 PM

Volcanic tremor remains low; Mt Ruapehu is at Volcanic Alert Level 1.

'Serious shortcomings' in pilot academy management and systems - authority

'Serious shortcomings' in pilot academy management and systems - authority

08 Jul 06:00 PM
Health NZ stops funds for Fit for Surgery programme

Health NZ stops funds for Fit for Surgery programme

08 Jul 05:01 PM
'The truth will come out': Scott Guy's parents speak 15 years after unsolved murder

'The truth will come out': Scott Guy's parents speak 15 years after unsolved murder

08 Jul 09:03 AM
Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky
sponsored

Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky

NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • Whanganui Chronicle e-edition
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Subscribe to the Whanganui Chronicle
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • NZME Events
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP
search by queryly Advanced Search