George, I support the thrust of your article but disagree that belittling of the religion of Judaism is deplorable. Would you not criticise the religion of the orthodox (male) Jew who thanks God daily that he was not born a woman?

@ Asclepius

Before coming out with, dare I say it, an antisemitic remark such as you have above, that you find out the reason behind it.

I won't bother telling you. Find out for yourself.

one should always ask .what would Australia do if it was at war.Israel has a peace (cold )with Egypt,slightly better with Jordon.what looks like a constant low level war some times hot with the rest .this has been going on for nearly 80 years .

trying to get resolution Israel gave a lot and put itself in danger a number of times .so if security is the primary concern it is not hard to understand .

if the critics and those of alleged goodwill want to help look and learn Arabic and counter the hate education that is produced in Gaza by Hamas and their cohorts

i wish George would spend some time trying to run a church in Gaza about six month should give him an insight

ben

Christianity, Islam and Judaism are ideologies and like any ideology, are fair game for criticism.

Nicely put - just about sums up my views.
I would go furthet and wonder about the legitimacy of
a nation state in Palestine that has been built
on mass migration from far away eastern Eiurope.

Same old technique of racists everywhere - grab something that's not theirs to grab, then greet every challenge to the grabbing as "racism". And wheedle the racists' sponsors into echoing the howl of "victimisation".

Jews have every right to application of the same standards as apply to everyone else. That doesn't extend to any right to grab someone else's land as their (proclaimed) race's special "homeland", extend and hold the enclave by force and violence.

Nor does it extend to any right to quarantine any superstition (including "God promised us your territory") from the ridicule and hostility to which every religious or non-religious ideological claim is rightly subject under common standards in a free society.

A few decades ago "the virus of anticommunism" was a swear-phrase deployed by Soviet scammers against any rejection of Communism. Not racist but essentially the same special pleading as that of the Zionist scammers over "antisemitism".