Demonstrating THE POWER of Taking Your Pen:

Dear Mr Davies        -           May 5, 2006

If, as you claim, you regret "sending an email in anger and pressing the send button" and if indeed you do regret what you did in calling Israel an apartheid state and meeting with Hamas, can you please explain to me why the offending article about Israel being an Apartheid state is still up on your website. You have had plenty of time to reconsider and remove it if you really mean what you say when you claim to be sorry and to have apologised.
I still await your response to my original mail to you as promised in an
email received last week.

I hope your action has not delivered a mortal blow to some Lib Dem candidates in the local election, and that it does not damage the credibility of my own MP who has written to me dissociating him from your offensive and unjustified remarks.
Timing is everything and causing such offence so close to elections is not the action of an astute politician.

Joy Wolfe

Manchester
Former Liberal councilor in Maidstone and LIB Dem candidate in Cheadle ward
for several years building it up to be a Lib Dem stronghold.
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Here follow two articles Joy accessed on Chris Davies' website after Davies claimed to have  apologised and to regret sending an email  

Tuesday 18, April 2006
Stop Israeli 'Apartheid' policies says Lib Dem Euro-MP
Hopes of creating a viable, independent Palestinian state are being destroyed on the ground by Israeli bulldozers, barbed wire and concrete walls, a Liberal Democrat MEP has claimed.
And Chris Davies warns that the EU's decision to suspend payments to the Palestinian Authority risks turning crisis into catastrophe.
An all-party delegation from the European Parliament met last week with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and newly elected members of the Palestinian Legislative Council, including supporters of both Hamas and Fatah groups.

Now the MEPs are seeking an urgent meeting with Javier Solana, the EU's High Representative on Foreign Affairs, to urge that dialogue begins before Palestinian despair erupts into violence that may spread far beyond the region.
Foreign Ministers agreed last week to cease support for the Palestinian Authority until the new Hamas-led government agrees to recognise Israel, renounce violence, and accepts previous agreements.
But the MEPs report that even moderate politicians in Palestine regard the stance as a collective punishment imposed because people made the 'wrong' choice in democratic elections. The resulting huge rise in unemployment will make it impossible to control social unrest, they fear.

Chris Davies, a North West representative who is leader of the British Liberal Democrats in the European Parliament, said that he had been shocked by what he had seen.
He commented: "Very rapid changes are taking place on the ground. Palestinian land is being carved up and communities isolated. The people compare themselves to hamsters kept in cages connected by tubes that are opened and shut at the whim of their Israeli masters. Economic progress is impossible.
"Towns are being physically divided and people denied the right to travel between them. Israel continues to steal land to expand illegal settlements served by roads that Palestinians are forbidden to use.  "We should be honest. These are the racist policies of apartheid yet Israel continues to pose as a victim. "I visited Auschwitz last year, and it is very difficult to understand why those whose history is one of such terrible oppression appear not to care that they have themselves become oppressors."
Mr Davies says he was asked repeatedly during his visit about EU double standards, with Palestinians being penalised while no action is taken to restrain Israel from flouting international law.
"Palestinian's are being subjected to intolerable pressure," he said. "Their democracy is not being respected, their land is being stolen, and their means of earning a living are being lost.

"The EU must speak up for justice. It must stop Israel breaking the law, and it must at least enter into dialogue with the new Palestinian government to try and secure the necessary change in approach."
The MEP believes that the gulf between the position of the Hamas-led government and the EU may be smaller than some suppose.  "Negotiation on the basis of 1967 borders implies recognition of the State of Israel," he said, "while the 'ceasefire' that Hamas has maintained deserves acknowledgement. Diplomacy may bridge the gaps."
Mr Davies condemned the latest suicide bombing in Tel Aviv as "morally wrong and politically self-defeating". He said that the taking of innocent life by Palestinians or Israelis could not be justified.

"The Speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council, Aziz Duack, asked me last week what I would do if I were in his shoes. I told him I would read the works of Gandhi. Violence will never bring Israel to the negotiating table."


Tuesday 11, April 2006
Lib Dem Euro Leader meets Hamas Speaker
The Leader of the British Liberal Democrat MEPs, Chris Davies, today met with a senior Hamas politician to discuss the way forward for negotiations on the future of Palestine.
Mr Davies, with MEPs of other nationalities, held talks in Ramallah with Mr Aziz Duack, Speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council. The meeting took place the day after EU Foreign Ministers agreed to withhold funding to the Palestinian Authority until the new Hamas-led government agrees to recognise Israel, abandon violence and honours previous
agreements.
The MEP said he regarded his meeting as taking place with a democratically elected spokesman of the Palestinian people rather than with a representative of the Hamas political grouping which is still a proscribed terrorist organisation.
He commented: "I can't say there was universal agreement. While we hold common views about the scale of injustice being experienced by Palestinians I argued that violence was self-defeating and played into the hands of Israeli hawks. I call for Palestinians to use non-violent means to promote their cause."
"I am deeply concerned by what I have heard from moderate Palestinians about the threat of violence as a result of the new Israeli Prime Minister's determination to abandon any pretence of negotiating an agreement based on 1967 borders.
"My fear is that the EU may have boxed itself into a corner by refusing talks with Hamas at every level. If there is no dialogue the risk of bloodshed can only increase."