Sir, As a former diplomat I find frustrating the exhortation to “quiet, painstaking diplomacy” in dealing with Iran (letter, Jan 30). Diplomacy is not a magic wand but a process, not unlike arbitration or marriage counselling; as with any negotiation it is founded on the balance of strengths between the parties.

It is right of the EU and US to demonstrate that this process has been tried and has failed with respect to Iran’s development of nuclear weapons. We will only avoid war with Iran by convincing the regime that we will launch these strikes if its present course is not reversed; only then will quiet, painstaking diplomacy have the weight to succeed.

Those who reject military action undermine diplomacy and make war all the more likely. Better, we might feel, to consider these options now than be forced to retaliate in like measure to Iran’s first nuclear strike on Israel.

JAMES DANCER
Second Secretary,
Belgrade, 2001-03
Nottingham

Sir, We are signally and tragically failing in Iraq, a country which, on invasion, had a decimated and demoralised army, no air power, no weapons of mass destruction, obsolete or poorly maintained military hardware, and an ideologically divided people demoralised by a generation of oppression and a decade of sanctions, many of whom supported our invasion.

Perhaps, then, it would be better for Jack Straw and his fellow saloon-bar warriors in Westminster to think twice about committing our young people to military action against Iran, a country with a modern army of half a million backed by air and naval support and a population with a willingness, as they have shown before, to die in their millions for their beliefs.

ERIC CAMPBELL
Harrogate, N Yorks

Sir, Jeremy Jones (letter, Jan 30) says that Iran should be allowed to have nuclear weapons. He says that Israel’s own nuclear weapons will deter Iran from using them.

But what happens when Iran gives a nuclear bomb to one of the terrorist groups it supports? It would be fairly easy for Iran to detonate one of its nuclear bombs in Tel Aviv with nothing more than a human terrorist delivery system. Against whom would Israel retaliate then?

JAMES GOLDMAN
London NW4

Sir, A golden opportunity has arisen for the European Union to say to Hamas: “Recognise the state of Israel and renounce violence or we will cut off any further funding.”

Hamas will say that will harm the Palestinians, but wasn’t it the Palestinians who voted them into power?

MICHAEL ROSS.
Dunkeswick, N Yorks

Sir, It is understandable that the West, and more particularly Israel, have severe problems in dealing with Hamas, in view of its record of violence against Israeli civilians. However, threats by the US and EU to stop the funding of the Palestinian Authority, which amounts to £275 million a year, and that by Israel not to pay the January VAT and custom dues amounting to about £30 million, are likely to be counter-productive. Not only will withdrawal confirm the Palestinian “ street” in its view that the West is biased towards Israel, which continues to flout international law by expanding settlements and the wall on Palestinian land — perhaps the major reason for the Hamas result — but this money is used in part to pay the salaries of 130,000 Palestinian civil servants and security personnel.

Its withdrawal will exacerbate the terrible poverty which Israeli closures, the wall and the authority’s poor economic management have already caused in the West Bank and Gaza, and will likely radicalise further the population, especially the young.

It reminds me of the American decision to dismantle the Iraqi Army and Civil Service after the fall of Saddam: this radicalised large numbers of Iraqis who had lost their livelihoods, and is generally considered to have strengthened the insurgency. Does anyone want that in Israel/Palestine?

DR MIKE BARNES
Watford, Herts

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