Letters to the Editor

SpcaLA ‘Partnership’

I recommend a correction to your March 7 front page story, “City Terminates 26-year Agreement with SpcaLA.” The term ‘partnership’ is misleading and reinforces a falsehood that has deceived the public for two and a half decades. The term, burrowed deep into the city vocabulary as spcaLA repeated so often that the city thought it was true.

It persisted through four mayors, three city attorneys, three city managers, four PRM directors and five bureau managers. SpcaLA even “explained” it in a marketing piece using the city’s logo to mislead the public. In 2020, with complaints from informed advocates, the city required spcaLA to stop using the city logo on its false marketing about the “partnership.”

It’s unfathomable that spanning until 2020, no one at City Hall sought to look for and understand the terms and conditions of this alleged partnership. Wouldn’t terms and conditions be essential for the city? If they had looked, they would have found none.

Eight years ago, a pair of community advocates sought answers. Through public records, they discovered the city had no partnership agreement and never had one. There were no terms, no conditions, nor had they ever existed. There was never legal counsel or City Council authorization. The partnership was a fable. The agreement between the city and spcaLA was spelled out very clearly.

The only thing the city agreed to was in the city’s Lease 29515, page 27, and Lease-Back 29518, page 15, “The relationship of the parties is hereto that of Landlord and Tenant and the parties agree that nothing contained in this Lease (or Leaseback) shall be deemed or construed as creating a partnership, joint venture, principal-agent, association, employer-employee relationship between them or between the city and any third person or entity.”

Laura Sellmer

Middle East Conflict

I read with interest the opposing views expressed in the letters of Marshall Blesofsky and David Alpern. I’m in agreement with Marshall Blesofsky. Most supporters of the current Israeli government, including our current and previous presidents, seem to be ignorant of, or blind to, the history of the conflict and act as though it began on October 7, 2023.

Hamas is indeed a vile terrorist organization, bent on the destruction of Israel. But so were Israeli terrorist gangs Irgun and the Stern Gang, active in ethnically cleansing 700,000 Palestinians civilians in 1948. The more recent Kach movement is also a good fit for that definition.

Evicted from their homes and seven decades of apartheid is the genesis of Hamas. But Hamas has been allowed to fester and is surreptitiously supported by Netanyahu and Likud to divide Palestinians factions: the Palestinian Authority and Hamas, as a tactic to forestall any notion of a unified “Palestinian State.”

Our government gives lip service to the “two state solution,” while obediently vetoing all UN resolutions to that effect and conveying a continuous supply of weapons that have rendered Gaza a wasteland.

Bill Ives

I was deeply disturbed by the opinion piece titled “Israel-Palestine Conflict: A Threat to Democracy in America,” published on Feb. 20. The author launched a disorganized and biased attack against the State of Israel and, even more troubling, against the Jewish community of Long Beach by accusing them of holding a “militant one-sided view of the conflict.”

Even more shockingly, the author goes to great lengths to justify the horrific acts of terror committed on Oct. 7, drawing inappropriate comparisons to the IRA and accusing the Jewish people of weaponizing the Holocaust for political gain.

Let’s set the record straight:

A. The events of Oct. 7 were not acts of resistance – they were acts of terrorism carried out by Hamas, a terrorist organization dedicated to the destruction of Israel and the murder of Jews. On that day, they crossed internationally recognized borders and slaughtered innocent civilians – men, women and children – in cold blood.

B. Israel is engaged in a legitimate war of self-defense against an enemy that seeks its destruction. No country in the world would tolerate such terror on its doorstep, and Israel has the right – and the obligation – to protect its citizens.

C. Comparing this situation to the IRA is both misleading and historically inaccurate. The Palestinian leadership has been offered statehood multiple times, including during negotiations facilitated by President Bill Clinton. Each time, these offers were rejected, not because of inadequate terms, but because of an unwillingness to accept a Jewish state in any form.

D. The core issue is not land – it is Hamas’ refusal to accept the existence of Israel. As clearly stated in their own charter, Hamas is committed not to the welfare of the Palestinian people but to the destruction of Israel.

E. The Jewish community of Long Beach stands firmly with Israel in its fight against terror. Any attempt to erase the historical truth that Israel is the ancestral homeland of the Jewish people is a blatant distortion of history and an affront to our identity. The Jewish people and the land of Israel are part and parcel.

This conversation must be grounded in facts, not distorted narratives or baseless accusations. Israel’s right to defend itself is not up for debate, and the Jewish community will continue to stand united against terror and for peace.

Rabbi Mendel Rosenbluh
& Mark Dressner, MD

Anti Common Sense

As a regular subscriber to the Beachcomber and a frequent visitor to Long Beach, I have often agreed with the common-sense opinions of the editor. However, it seems that the November election has disrupted the editor’s common-sense compass. As a scientist I am a strong believer not just in energy efficiency but also in financial efficiency.

I am against inefficient government and wasteful spending (the Pentagon’s high-priced weapons come to mind). But President Trump and Elon Musk are not helping but only creating chaos, with the president adding nonsense about Canada, Greenland and Panama and demonstrating his lack of respect for our allies and other countries.

By the way, having enormous wealth does not mean that you have great wisdom. President Trump is apparently trying to change our country’s alliances from NATO to Russia, and abandoning Ukraine. As a refugee from Russian controlled Hungary in 1956 and an American citizen, I am shocked.

Our national debt and annual deficits are not due to overspending, but a significant drop in national revenues from high earners, corporations and tax cuts for these groups. Additionally, presidents (Republican and Democratic) have charged all war costs to our national credit card instead of paying for these in the budget. This started under President Reagan.

Finally, it is worth reminding members of Congress that the Social Security and Medicare funds are not money that Congress can spend, because this money was paid into those trust funds by the payroll deductions of working people.

Dr. Peter Somssich
Former NH State Representative