As for what you said later:
“You are becoming a disgrace to your own religions on both sides, you are fighting for land that DOES NOT BELONG TO ANY OF US, IT IS GOD’S LAND NOT OURS.” If you really believe in God that usually means you believe in the Bible, and according to the Bible GOD gave the land to the Jewish people. He commanded them to settle and inhabit the land.

One last note regarding what you said that they are being bad Jews: it is not your place to judge them! If you are saying that what they are doing is wrong ethically, then say that. That point has been argued in discussions above and seems to have been disproved. But if you are saying that they are violating the word of GOD, and being bad Jews, you will either have to bring some really good proof for that or hold your religious beliefs to yourself.
thank you

First – John – I only want to comment on one thing that you wrote early on:

“And yes, everyone who criticizes Israel’s policies is anti-Semitic, an easy thing to sling around, though it’s been slung around so easily and with such lack of discrimination for so long that it’s long since lost all its ability to cow critics of Israel.

Nothing could cow me from being a critic of Israel because of the stability of my love for it. It’s precisely how I feel about the United States as well.

When you make a comment like that, John, you’re heading into Michele Bachmann territory – she was the Minnesota GOP congressional incumbent who told Chris Matthews that the media needs to investigate all members of Congress to determine which ones are anti-America and which ones are pro-America.

There is nothing that would cow me from criticizing the USA or Israel – despite the fact that I love and feel lucky to live in the USA and I love and feel lucky to be a Jew.

Now – there are a couple of blog posts I’d really love for the readers of this thread to read, because I think they do an excellent job of highlighting how someone can love Israel and criticize it as well and, even if someone wants to call me an anti-Semite for that, I – along with many, many others – will reject it every time, just as I will reject being told I’m anti-America because I voted for Obama or because I think Bush completely $&@%ed up this country and so on.

Here’s the first post, written by an Israeli-Canadian journalist who lives in Tel Aviv. It is long but worth reading ALL of it, please.

The second thing I’d like you to read is the latest news about how some members of the Knesset want to ban the Israeli Arab parties from participating in elections. This is the kind of thing that drives left of center Jews who love Israel (having lived there by the way), absolutely CRAZY.

It is late and there is always more to say except so few people take the time and effort and stamina to stick with this. I know, I know. Just today I was called for comment by The Jewish Week – a friend who is a professor in NYC didn’t want to talk to them because he said that he just can’t care anymore about it – he is Jewish.

We are responsible for turning off people from engaging in a meaningful way – and part of the reason for that is the polarization. We must not allow that to happen – we must keep bringing it around, not only to the facts and the specifics, but also to the future and reality. Even people who talk in the lingo “60 year occupation” (and often end up going into a push for a one state solution) can often be heard to say that they recognize that Israel isn’t going anywhere, so there must be an end to the violence.

But people are so afraid. The region has been so dependent on the threat of violence to keep things in check. We must replace that threat with trust – knowing that it’s difficult is never an adequate response.

Finally, if you didn’t already read my piece from earlier today, please read it now (here)- it is about the complete failure of Hamas at leading, which is in fact what it was elected to do. On that basis alone, Hamas can be seen as not speaking for or acting on behalf of and certainly not acting in the best interests of the Palestinians.

Thank you all for engaging. You can lob the salvos at me now.