I would like to air my views in response to the letter ‘Allow us our pilgrimages to Israel’ .

It is a well-known fact that Israel uses underhand tactics to enable its products to gain entrance into international markets. Some Israeli products are repackaged in Third World countries to gain access into markets where Israeli goods are not welcome.

Labels on products from Jewish settlements in the West Bank often omit where they were made and many people suspect that American fast-food companies use chili sauce and olives which were exported from the Jewish settlements.

The Christian holy sites in the Palestinian territories such as the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Arab East Jerusalem and the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem are not part of Israel. Israel has absolutely no right to them.

Yet Israel milks them for tourism and makes millions of dollars from tourism revenue from Christians who visit these sites. The Palestinian people are not even given the opportunity to earn a living from their holy sites as Israel has usurped these sites for its own financial benefit.

The Palestinian people suffer from astronomical unemployment levels yet this tourism revenue which is their entitlement is being denied and robbed from them.

So, unless tourists from Malaysia can guarantee that they will use Palestinian tour guides and pay Palestinian tour operators and use Palestinian bus companies and stay at Palestinian-owned hotels and eat Palestinian cooked dishes, any request to visit the holy sites should be denied until Israel returns them to their rightful owners, the Palestinians.

The Palestinians are descendants of the Apostles of Jesus Christ (the first Christians) and it would be unethical for them to be left out of the equation with regards to tourism revenue.