The sacking of British politician Jenny Tonge from her party post for speaking out on the desperation that drives Palestinian suicide bombers is appalling.
That an elected member of Parliament should be censured for speaking her mind flies in the face of what democracy is supposed to be all about.
Ms Tonge, now dismissed from her post as Liberal Democratic Party spokeswoman on children, is guilty of nothing but a compassionate understanding of the plight of a nation living under brutal occupation.
She did not condone killing on either side, but said she understood the desperation that could drive someone to sacrifice their own life to attack their oppressors.
Ms Tonge was speaking in the context of a nation without an army which has had its land stolen and is currently literally being walled in by the Israelis.
Its men are stopped from working, their orchards and farmland have been destroyed and children are often barred from reaching school.
Palestine is a victim of military and economic terrorism and the list of children and other unarmed civilians killed by Israeli bullets is growing every day.
The scale may not have yet reached that of the horrors within Iraq under Saddam Hussein, but the world should be equally outraged at the systematic murder of people under the occupation of a foreign force.
What hope can there ever be for these people if the West is not even prepared to listen when someone like Ms Tonge speaks out, in an attempt to spread a little understanding of their plight?
She was not condoning the killing when she remarked about the bombers: "If I was in their situation ... I might just think about it myself."
For the "situation" she was talking about is one which could drive the most peaceful of people to violence.
When people see their families butchered, when yet another child is carried to his grave, when all hope is lost and still the world will not listen, what do we expect?
World leaders talk of a new world order, of the war on terrorism and of struggling for a lasting peace - yet they ignore the small but brutal war which has been waged against the Palestinian people for more than 50 years.
Britain's Liberal Democratic Party leader Charles Kennedy is a coward for seeking to silence Ms Tonge when he should have rallied behind her, under the flag of human compassion.
*Les Horton is editor of Gulf Daily News (GDN). This article was first published in GDN on 26 January 2004.
© Gulf Daily News