‘I’ve decided to embrace the spirit of Passover as best I can by being the ‘simple son’ in the Haggadah, the one who asks the most straightforward and innocent questions. After all, I’m a foreigner, a tourist. An idiot.

“What would happen if a Jew walked across the Qalandia checkpoint and into the refugee camp?”

“He’d be torn apart limb from limb,” Martin says.’

You may insist that you’re not like Martin, because you don’t harbour such fears where Palestinians in Qalandia are concerned – your fear is exclusively for Gaza, which is a different thing entirely. Your fears are reasonable, unlike Martin’s. Those remote Palestinians in Gaza really WOULD hurt you, unlike the harmless specimens at Taybeh. Most Israelis seem to have a Palestinian bogeyman somewhere, whether it’s in Gaza or Ramallah or the cupboard under the stairs. No matter what address you give it, it doesn’t exist.

Are there Palestinians out there who would hurt you if they got the opportunity? Yes. I grew up in Saudi Arabia, and the threat of terrorist attacks was part of my day-to-day existence – I am familiar with evacuation drills and security guards and the need to have your sleeping quarters behind a metal blast-door that can resist grenades. But what does it prove? Just that certain people want to harm me. I haven’t got a clue where they are. They could be anyone, anywhere. All I know is that for every Saudi that would harm me, there are thousands that would help me. I know this because I lived amongst them. If you lived amongst Gazans maybe you would make the same discovery. But the Gazans are remote from you, exactly as the Israeli government wants them to be, and so they remain fearsome.

That little term and condition of yours kind of flies in the face of the liberal notion of freedom of speech

I don’t need any lectures fr. you about free speech. This blog isn’t Constitution Hall or the town square. It’s a blog & as such subject to rules I’ve foudn expedient after the publication of 30,000 comments here. You follow the rules or you’re up & out. Your choice.

I would in fact go so far as to nominate you as the Secretary of Information for Hamas.

Now, that’s a comment rule violation that gets you banned. You were warned. You get one warning & the next serious violation you’re gone. Nice to know ya.

do you agree or disagree that that Israel is a hotbed for the innovation and development of this very “sophisticated technology” that enables you to bring yourself so up to date on Israeli military & intelligence developments?

You’ll have to tell me what technology I’m using that is Israeli in my research. And besides, this bit of hasbara has nothing to do w. anything. Do you think Israel develops web technology specifically to further democracy around the world?? Hardly. In fact, Israel’s contributions are in the line of security & defense related intrusive technology w military/counter-terror applications. That counts me out since I don’t dabble in any of that.

Should we examine dessert agriculture and drip irrigation technology?

So you’re claiming that Israel developed this out of the goodness of its heart & shared it w. it neighbors in the spirit of brotherly love? And can you show me that any of Israel’s neighbors actually use this technology?

How about advancements in aerospace?

I see. So Israel’s drone technology which hunts down & kills Palestinian militants (give or take a few dozen civilians killed in ancillary action) benefits Israel’s neighbors? Or those missiles Israel develops? That benefits them?

Want to talk about Sustainable food packaging?

I have no idea what this means & certainly doubt any of Israel’s neighbors is benefiting fr. whatever it is.

What about the number of Israeli Noble Prize winners?

This little bit of pro Israel boosterism is rapidly going dull beyond belief. I don’t give a fig how many Israeli Nobel laureates there are. How have any of them benefited any of Israel’s neighbors, which was yr original claim?

Russian Jews who were fleeing religious persecution, coming to Israel and working productively in the development of the State

And Palestinians haven’t suffered persecution at the hands of Israel that would justify their return? And you think the returning Palestinians wouldn’t work productively within Israel on their return? You simply don’t understand immigrants & the enormous benefits they bestow on their chosen countries.

Why is it that a two state solution where they have the right of return to the new Democratic State of Palestine is so unacceptable?

Because they weren’t expelled from Bethlehem, Ramallah or Nablus, but from Jaffa, Jerusalem & places within Israel.

Palestinians whose basis for return is to dismantle Israel as the homeland of the Jews.

Do you have to be such a dolt? They’re returning to reclaim the homes they were torn fr. by the then new State of Israel. They will become as good citizens of their new home as the current Israeli Palestinians.

Why can Jews not live in the Democratic State of Palestine

First, there is not such state because Israel refuses to negotiate for its creation. Second, Jews DO live in Palestine & have always lived there. Not in great numbers, but they do. And Palestinian leaders have guaranteed the right of Jews to continue doing so after Israel finally DOES recognize such a state.

What do they look like now?

And you’re claiming that because Gazans destroyed the greenhouses of the Jewish settlements in hatred of what they represented to them, that this means Palestinians aren’t entitled to a state of their own??? If foolishness & depravity were the judge of whether a people is entitled to a state of their own, Israelis would never have earned one in 1948.

they simply rounded up their political opponents and smashed their knee caps, threatened their families and even executed a few.

You’re simply fahrdreyt in kup & don’t know what you’re talking about. The actual election was ruled free & fair by all the expert observers who monitored it. But after the election, when Fatah engineeered a coup against Hamas & the latter responded by violently taking control in Gaza & suppressing Fatah’s supporters there (as Fatah was doing just as ruthlessly in the W. Bank) then there was violence. But this was not part of an electoral process. In fact, just the opposite. It was Fatah w. the encouragement & connivance of the Bush folks, who tried to do an end run around a free & fair election.

Now they patrol the streets with their goon squads and burn down UN sponsored day camps for kids, all normal behavior for democratically elected officials.

And you’re claiming that Hamas is doing this? With what proof? Proof? Who needs proof when you have certainty? Even certainty derived fr. ignorance, hate & racism. But certainty nonetheless.

you call HIM disingenuous.

Yes, I do. Disingenuous & dishonest mean diff. things. Do you need a vocabulary lesson. I am not dishonest & will not let anyone here accuse me of being so. You don’t like the rules, no one asked you to spend time here. But them’s the rules.

Israel’s assistance being refused by the Iranians in recovering and treating CIVILIAN casualties of a massive earthquake

Now, YOU are being disingenous. You know as well as I that if there was an earthquake in Israel & Iran offered assistance that Bibi would spit on the offer. So don’t go around in high moral dudgeon about Iran’s refusal of such help. Besides, Israel’s offers of help in such situations are entirely politically, rather than humanistically motivated.

I want to give the option to be “spared”.

You lost that option long ago as you lost the option to continue contributing to this blog’s comment threads.

We have not seen a suicide bomber recently because Israel built a wall.

More crap. Israel’s Wall is not complete & hundreds of thousands of Palestinians cross it seeking work & other opportunities. Any suicide bomber who wished could cross it at will there there is no wall.

Israel is home to the Jews

And the Arabs, and Druze & Bedouin & Christians who you seem conveniently to forget.

with morons like yourself

You really wanted to get banned didn’t you.

why don’t you go explain to those Lebanese why their country needs to be in a state of war with Israel

Maybe because Israel holds hundreds of Lebanese prisoners in its jails & also Lebanese-Syrian territory which it refuses to relinquish.

their leadership has squandered billions of $$$ in foreign aid in personal swiss bank accounts

And you know this because you read it in Yisrael HaYom or Maariv? Besides, are you claiming that Israeli politicians are any more honest? Ehud Olmert anyone??

I truly am sincere about my condolences

You truly are a creepy insincere fraud. Faith will not be taken in by yr sincere thoughtful pose.