Even when I object to something that a friend or family is saying, I'll still enthusiastically celebrate their milestones.

They are as enthusiatic as you, just less average American
tax dollars devoted to your enthusiasm.

I Hope all the white niggers in Indiana somehow get off their
trailer camps and inch up to the window of opportunity.

http://rockslinga.blogspot.com/2008/04/arabic-is-not-disease.html

Randa is a young Palestinian-American writer with plenty of short story credits whose first novel is coming out soon.

There must be an approach that is not so either/or, insisting on choosing which child to kill.

Oooh now that's intriguing. Phil, are your people the zionists?

Richard, I don't think you've ever clarified your position on this one — Can one be a Jew and not be zionist?

I'm neither of course, so perhaps I am not even allowed to ask the question. Let me know if that is the case.

Absolutely.

Zionism is a means to safe and vibrant Jewish community.

If there were another means to confidently defend one's community without weapons, without a state, that would be wonderful.

Chinese culture, Mexican culture, Jewish culture all thrive inside U.S. borders, and have for centuries already, for instance. They evolve and develop new forms and preserve some of the old.

The communities however change, sometimes radically. They grow, shrink, diversify, evolve, collapse and reappear, relocate, transform.

That's what happened to much of the actual Jewish community of Palestine 2,000 years ago. They splintered and grew and transformed over the course of history into some of the very people who still humbly and against all odds reside in places like Hebron, where they are no longer entitled to any safe and vibrant community, because of they read a newer book, pray five times a day, still to the same God, with many of the same prophets, but in a different language, with different customs.

The "Jewish people" you want to protect are a much more modern invention, but you are right: they deserve a safe and vibrant community. One that isn't a racist colonial project gone brutally wrong.

It's amazing to me how earnestly you've continued to stake your territory on the wrong side of history.

Richard, I see your logic now. Zionism is unjustifiable on its own, but when coupled with the end of a "safe and vibrant Jewish community" it all works out because…

"The Ends Justify the Means," eh?

Gosh, I think my parents taught me in first or second grade that was unethical and immoral, and that the ends NEVER justify the means. In fact, I think Hitler ascribed to that philosophy.

Inconvenient facts I guess.

By the way, your "Jewish community" is half secular, and 20% Arab.