Numbers game
Sir: In view of David Sorensen's mention of PLO terrorism (Letters 28 August) perhaps readers would be interested in the findings of an Israeli journalist, Mr Baruch Leshem, Published in the Hebrew daily Ha'aretz of 16 July 1982.
At the beginning of 'Operation Peace for Galilee' Ariel Sharon, the Israeli Defence Minister, announced as a justification for the war that Palestinian terrorism had claimed 1,392 victims in the past 15 years. Yet when Mr Leshem consulted police files, he found that only 282 civilian citizens of Israel had been thus killed in this time span. How then did Mr Sharon arrive at his total? Firstly by including the 285 Israeli soldiers killed in IDF campaigns against the PLO; secondly by adding 392 Arabs from the ter- ritories, some of whom had been killed While preparing explosives; and thirdly by counting 326 citizens of various other coun- tries killed by a wide range of terrorist organisations for diverse reasons. As Ha'aretz stated:. 'I should not be surprised if Aldo Moro and Lord Mountbatten would rigure among these'.
Even so, a gap still exists between the above total and that quoted by Mr Sharon for which no explanation has been given.
Fiona Moffitt,
Maristow, kosyl Avenue, Holcombe, bawlish, Devon
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