Boaz,

Thanks for the support, but it is problematic to base Israel's right to exist on the bible, because that would require Israel to be a strictly religious state (and one side-effect would be denying civil-rights from any non-Jews), which it is not, and every time Israel sins and break the Law (which is human and common) - their rights for the land can be suspended again.

Strewth, it is the Arab leaders who cause their own people's nightmare. Israel was always considerate, generous and forgiving towards Arabs, before its formation and after (of course as in any human society there were from time to to time individual bad apples - which should be rightly brought to justice), but Israel also knows how to defend itself when necessary. All the Arabs needed, and still need if they wanted or still want to stop the suffering of their "Palestinians", is to stop attacking Israel, or even better - not have attacked Israel in the first place. It is as simple as that. The more tantrums they throw about the very existence of the state of Israel, which they do not accept, the more unnecessary suffering they inflict upon themselves.

Pericles... I was making the point to Strewth, that you in fact underline, -basically human situations are based on power/might etc, not concepts of justice as he seems to be pushing.
He is going to unending ends, to justify the plight and victimhood and 'rightness' of the Arabs returning to former villages etc, and I'm saying that they have as much (or little) right as all of us to our former ancestral homes. The deciding factor in all of it is simple- 'might may not be 'right', but it sure counts and sways the issue'.

The only reason some aboriginal activists do not 'hunt our sorry asses down' and chase us back overseas is that they don't have the means.

Yuyu
I take your point about the Biblical right to the land, but your mention of the loss of that right when Israel sinned is not exactly true. During the Old Testament time they had the 'Day of Atonement' which dealt with that aspect. They were exiled/punished only when things had become so bad, that the nation as a whole had departed from the covenant relationship. e.g. high places, fertility/gods and symbols, temple cult prostitutes etc. Rotten from the king down to the street sweeper kind of thing. But note, (2 chronicles 7.13)
Also Isaiah 40 1-5 etc.. Jeremiah 31:31 (please read these)

Human rights.

The O.T. was most generous to 'the Alien/foreigner' and there were laws to protect them. The only thing they could not do was intermarry and enter the holy place. They could also embrace Yahweh and become Israelites by conversion.

I have no doubt that Israel would take whatever measures needed to ensure that they could never be 'democratically' dispossessed, and this would always be a bone of contention to those not identifying with the idea of Israel's right to exist.

It would inevitably mean at some stage the transferrance/exile of significant elements of the population or barring them from voting, due to the relatively high fertility rates of Arabs compared to Jews.

HR could only 'work' with politically insignificant pockets of non Jews in Israel.

Yuyu, allow me to quote Samuel Johnson's wise words: "Mankind have a great aversion to intellectual labour; even supposing knowledge to be easily attainable, more people would content to be ignorant than would take even a little trouble to acquire it." Please meditate on that. Then, as it sinks in, go, as I have already advised, to a bookshop and purchase The Other Side of Israel by (Jewish Israeli) Susan Nathan. Read it and THEN make up your mind on the matters we've discussed. And remember, with friends like Bamboozle, who needs enemies. Cheers.

So it goes that the wolf and the sheep lived in the forest by the same stream.

One day the wolf came down to the sheep and told it:
W: "You are polluting my water"
S: "this cannot be because you live upstream and I live downstream"
W: "so what?"
S: "then my pollutants can only travel further away and not towards you.
W: "why?"
S: "well, there is a force of gravity: here Newton explains that it is proportional to the masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance, and since the closest and heaviest object is the earth, which center is this way, and since the stream slopes this way towards it, then the water accelerates only this way at a rate of 9.8 metres/second^2 times the sine of the streams' slope".
W (who previously seemed to know nothing of physics): Oh, but this force only applies to the center of gravity, and because water is a liquid where particles are not affixed to that center, it is still possible for some smaller drops that circle around it to flow the other way."
S: "but in this case, here are a couple of waterfalls between us, and no drop of water can flow up through them"
W: "'nough talking, I'm going to eat you up and not leave one bit, RIGHT NOW"

At this point, the sheep pulled an Uzi, and the wolf cried:

"GOOD PEOPLE, HELP!! I AM DISPOSESSED: this evil sheep is trying to deprive my poor children of their breakfast".

I see. "Consistency requires you to be as ignorant today as you were a year ago." Sad.

Yuyutsu,

"the sheep pulled an Uzi, and the wolf cried"

Let try your logic:

* The sheep took the wolf's land and gave it to the settlers, ensuring new conflicts will all following generations.
* The sheep is unable to define his borders. Suffering split personality disorder, once the land follows secular legal borders, the other follows religious biblical ones.
* The sheep have secretly manufactured enough nukes to take all wolves, lions and associated forests.

Some magic sheep that is, I would say the least of his wonders is pulling the Uzi!.