June 7, 2002
Mr. Edward Pilkington, Editor
The Guardian
119 Farrington Road
London EC1R 3ER
England
Dear Mr. Pilkington:
We want to take this opportunity to thank you for permitting staff to do the
June 5th story on our adopted son, Mordechai Vanunu.
We would like to clarify some misconceptions that may have resulted from the
story.
We want readership to know that Mordechai is a very gentle and soft-spoken
person, and yet very strong in his principles and beliefs. He is as grateful
of our adoption as we are in his consenting to it and permitting us to enter
into his life and his struggle for freedom and a nuclear free world. He has
always been considerate of our family and did indeed meet our youngest son.
He extends his greetings to our grandchildren by sending candies that he is
able to purchase in the prison canteen, and offers us hospitality with
cookies and soft drinks. He appreciates our visits as much as we do in
visiting with him.
Enduring years and years of humiliation and degradation in prison,
(including 11 1/2 of which he spent in a 6' by 9 ' solitary cell) is
dehumanizing, to say the least, and so Mordechai asserts his humanity as he
feels appropriate under the circumstances, and we applaud him for doing so.
As his adoptive parents, we can only begin to imagine the hardships he
experiences in our brief conversations with him. When we do not share his
approach to incidents, he is frank to tell us that we have not suffered what
he has experienced for over sixteen years and so we deeply respect the
courage of his convictions.
His conversion to the Anglican faith may have been a stumbling block to his
Jewish Orthodox family, but two of his brothers have actively engaged in the
international efforts to gain his release, and the brother who lives in
Jerusalem visits him regularly.
We ask that all of his faithful friends and human rights advocates continue
to remember him by writing letters of encouragement.
Sincerely,
Nick and Mary Eoloff
St. Paul, Minnesota, USA
