Unnamed

I'd like to correct one point in your generally generous story on my talk at Hillel last Wednesday ("Professor Mufti advises direct US involvement in Israel," Nov. 3). I am quoted as saying that "now moral people blow themselves up to kill Israelis." My comment came in the context of lamenting the erosion of decency and moderation on both sides as a result of the escalating conflict. After talking about the Israelis, I observed that on the Palestinian side this erosion has reached a stage where suicide bombings are now being carried out not only by hardened radicals, but by apparently normal -- I guess the reporter heard "moral" -- people such as the female law student who blew herself up some weeks ago. My intent, in short, was precisely to highlight the corrupting effects of the conflict, and certainly not to describe the killers of innocent civilians as moral.