Steven Spielberg gets a Time magazine cover  for his new movie on Israel's response to the Munich massacre of 1972. Spielberg indicates he wants to give it a try to "solve" the Middle East stalemate. Aside from the chutzpah, how about a basic English lesson.  Solve the stalemate?

As for another Spielbergism related to violence begetting more violence ("a response to a response does not solve anything") this sounds like moral equivalence territory: suicide bomber terror attacks against Israeli civilians or the murder of Olympic athletes are one and the same as Israel's response to these crimes.

Time says there were rumors that Spielberg was too pro—Israel to make a fair movie. With Tony Kushner, author of many anti—Israel screeds as the screenwriter for the new film Munich, this sounds like a disinformation campaign to reassure Jews about a movie which apparently suggests that the Israelis who hunted down the perpetrators and killers in Munich had second thoughts about their mission.  

If instead of hunting  them down,  Israel had opened its heart to the murderers,  invited them to break bread, sung Kumbayah together, and then gone to the movies, maybe the conflict could have been resolved by now. 

I will go out on a limb, but not too far: Even after Spielberg's movie comes out,and is shown around the globe, the Israeli Palestinian conflict will continue.  Maybe if there is a big box office gross (not assured for political movies), the film—maker, reportedly worth almost $3 billion, can send some of his profits to victims of terror attacks in Israel.

Richard Baehr   12 04 05