Does Alice "The Color Purple" Walker Care About Gilad Shalit?

As observed in my prior blog entry (http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.com/2011/06/alice-walker-why-im-sailing-to-gaza.html), Alice Walker, the 67-year-old author of "The Color Purple," seeks to explain her participation in the latest Gaza flotilla in a CNN piece entitled "Why I'm Sailing to Gaza" (http://edition.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/06/21/alice.walker.gaza/). Walker, invoking the names of Gandhi and Martin Luther King, would have us believe that she is a martyr in the making:

"Our boat, The Audacity of Hope, will be carrying letters to the people of Gaza. Letters expressing solidarity and love. That is all its cargo will consist of. If the Israeli military attacks us, it will be as if they attacked the mailman. This should go down hilariously in the annals of history. But if they insist on attacking us, wounding us, even murdering us, as they did some of the activists in the last flotilla, Freedom Flotilla I, what is to be done?"

Letters to the people of Gaza expressing solidarity and love? Very touching. But where is Walker's love for the Israeli children living in the proximity of Gaza, who have been forced to endure thousands of mortar shells, rockets and missiles fired from Gaza at their homes?

Also, where is Walker's love for Gilad Shalit, who was abducted from Israel on June 25, 2006 by Hamas, and who has been held hostage ever since in Gaza without visits from or contact with the International Committee of the Red Cross in violation of international law?

Notwithstanding Walker's apparent indifference to Shalit's plight, White House spokesman Jay Carney on Friday called upon Hamas to free this young man:

“Nearly five years have now passed since Hamas terrorists crossed into Israel and abducted Gilad Shalit. During this time, Hamas has held him hostage without access by the International Committee of the Red Cross, in violation of the standards of basic decency and international humanitarian demands. The United States condemns in the strongest possible terms his continued detention, and joins other governments and international organizations around the world in calling on Hamas to release him immediately.”

The U.S. has now joined France, the European Union and Ban Ki-moon of the UN in calling for Shalit's immediate release on humanitarian grounds.

Walker and her friends from the far left, however, are too busy pretending that they are heroines and heroes to acknowledge this travesty. This is not surprising given Walker's position that Israel, because of alleged human rights abuses, should not exist as an actual land for the Jewish people, but should be theoretical "in our minds" (see: http://www.beyttikkun.org/article.php/20090930114030409).