To the Editor:
In your report that Dennis Ross will address the Washington conference of J Street, you refer to our group as describing itself as "pro-Israel and pro-peace." We describe ourselves that way because that is what we are. The words "describe themselves" and your quotation marks around "pro-Israel and pro-peace" imply that there is some question about whether we are pro-Israel, which there is not.
To believe that a two-state solution is the only way to secure Israel’s security and prosperity over the long term is to believe in Israel’s right to exist and its necessity as a democratic homeland for the Jewish people. That is not the same as believing that the present government’s policies are best designed to secure that goal.
Irwin Wall
J Street
New York, N.Y.
