To speak in Sam Harris’s terms rationality is key. I am proud of my Jewish heritage and I love our culture. Although every person within my family believes in G-d, I still find the idea ridiculous. I love Israel and I am pro-Israeli. This being said, my beliefs are not swayed by my personal affiliation. Yes, my personal affiliation led me to my present beliefs (way back when I wan’t an Athiest), but my rational thinking keeps me understanding them. I am pro-Israeli due to many reasons, but all of my many reasons are rational and based on facts. I have yet to hear a rational argument from those who support the Palestinian side.
To snakechic Yes, I am aware of the problems Australia is facing, and it is unfortunate that a great deal of the media is based on the Middle East. However, as you might be aware, there are a great deal many Arab countries and they are not of a small size. Hence, their incredible (although not credible on many points) P.R.. It is due to the fact that a good percentage of the world is of arab ethnicity that the media is revolving around the Middle East Conflict. Unfortunately, there tends to be sanity in numbers. Majority, unfortunately, has the floor. Personally, I feel that many issues must be addressed in the media, but being an Athiest, one learns that he/she cannot have it his/her way in most cases. lol However, I do feel that Israel is under great scrutiny. Additonally, I do not feel that the opposing side receives even one-fifth of the scrutiny Israel does. Although I can understand why this is so, we have yet to mass produce alternative energy cars, and oil is a greatly desired import product. However, I do not feel that the corruption of present-day politics justifies the fact that Israel is always being critisized for the majority of its actions, and the “Palestinians”, or Iran or Syria are not. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has blatantly said that his wish is to wipe Israel off the map, and all of the U.N. remains silent. Then he pursues nuclear weapons when the U.N. specifically forbid it, and nonetheless nothing is being done. But “god” forbid that Israel enters into a war with Lebanon to retrieve its soldiers, who were kidnapped by Hezbullah, then everyone starts protesting and yelling genocide all of the globe. Even when the day after the kidnapping, the leader of Hezbullah states on television (I was in Jerusalem at the time) that he was completely justified to kidnap the soldiers and if their requests (the release of hundreds of terrorist prisoners) are not fulfilled, those two soldiers are going to die. I have yet to see Israel try such a tactic with the Arab countries. Not only is it completely unjust to release hundreds of dangerous men and dangerous for Israel, it is dangerous for the rest of the world, as well. This is how I feel about the situation as a whole, the Arab countries are bears, who are very angry with the human (israel) standing in front of them. It is useless to try “diplomacy” or to try to talk to the bears, and tell them not to attack him, because it won’t help. However, if the human takes a weapon of some sort and threatens the bears with it, the bears will think twice before attacking.
