The occupation is destroying Israel’s democracy regardless of what kind of spin is put on it

"An Occupying Power Cannot Be a Beacon of Democracy"? Nonsense. How about US occupying a hunk of Germany? US occupying Japan? US occupying Afghanistan? US occupying Iraq? In each of those cases, US was a beacon of democracy. In some places it was followed by the occupied, in others it wasn't - but the fact remains that what you say makes no sense… Sorry…"

To equate the American military presence in Germany, which is an integral part of NATO's military installations in Europe, to Israel's occupation of the West Bank, is baffling. Moreover, American troops in Germany are welcome in the country, and while the German people are split over the presence of US military bases, successive German governments want them to stay. The critic obviously did not do his homework. There are military bases and American troops ranging from tens to tens of thousands in approximately 80 countries. Thus, according to the logic of this critic, the US currently occupies 80 different countries, which is of course the height of absurdity.

Furthermore, the US is not incarcerating thousands of foreign citizens in the countries where it maintains military bases. It is not conducting night raids, it is not restricting the movement of people in their own land, and it is not settling civilian communities throughout their territories, all of which Israel practices routinely in the West Bank. If, for example South Korea or Japan had a contiguous land mass with the US and if their people lived side-by-side US citizens but did not enjoy the same rights and privileges as US citizens, then the US would be considered undemocratic, an apartheid state at that. Simply put, no country can call itself a democracy while it simultaneously exercises authoritarianism over other countries and people that share the same land mass.

"How can a nation be an occupier of its own ancestral land? Or maybe you mean New Mexico, Colorado and Arizona? So, which is the occupier?"

I wonder if this critic will be willing to apply the same postulate to other people anywhere else in the world. If every indigenous peoples came back to reclaim the land of their ancestors from 2,000 years ago, the world's map would not even remotely resemble the current borders that delineate nearly 200 countries. Moreover, I wonder how this critic will respond to the following hypothesis: suppose the Jews were living in Palestine for hundreds of years, yet the Palestinians occupied the same land more than 2,000 years before, and now have come back to reclaim it. Should the Israeli Jews concede that the land indeed belongs to the Palestinians, because it was their ancestral land two millennia ago? Indeed, for how many centuries do people need to live on any land to claim it as their own?

Instead of finding a formula whereby both people, Israelis and Palestinians, can coexist peacefully and negotiate a two-state solution, if for no other reason other than the fact that Israel simply cannot evict all three million Palestinians from the West Bank, instead, Israel is opting to maintain the occupation and conveniently claim that a nation cannot be an occupier of its own ancestral land, despite the passage of thousands of years and the peoples who have lived on the land in the intervening millennia. If this is not twisted logic, I don't know what is.

"You are delusional. Either the IDF controls Judea/Samaria or Iran controls Judea/Samaria. Pick one. I guess you pick Iran. So, tell your readers that!"

Can this or any other critic tell us how and by what means Iran will be able to control Judea and Samaria, the West Bank? Any talk of a two-state solution that will put an end to the occupation will have to be based on categorical and unshakable security arrangements between Israel, Palestine, and Jordan. This has been discussed time and again in the past, and the Palestinians want such security arrangements for their own sake just the same. Even at the present, Israel and the Palestinian Authority collaborate on all security matters.

The PA knows full well that Israel will not relinquish a single inch of territory unless there is an iron clad security arrangement in place to ensure its national security. Moreover, no country, including Iran, will ever be in a position to control the West Bank given Israel's formidable military prowess that will crush any foreign power that challenges Israel's military dominance now or at any time in the future, even if an independent Palestinian state has been established.

"I agree with every word you write. However, I think that before talking about a Palestinian state, Israel must improve the situation of its own Arab population. The Israeli Arabs can and must become the bridge between the Jewish Israelis and the Palestinians."

There should be no doubt that Israel must address the discrimination against its own Arab citizens; however, it cannot ignore the urgent need to find a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The two are not mutually exclusive and must be tackled simultaneously, as indeed one can complement the other.

In last week's demonstration in Tel Aviv against the so-called judicial reforms, demonstrators also carried banners proclaiming that the occupation is incompatible with democracy. As they see it, the judicial reforms if enacted and the continuing occupation would destroy Israel's democracy, and the public must now relentlessly fight against these two menaces to save Israel's democracy.

To be sure, the Israeli occupation has no logical, political, or biblical justification or even national security implications. It not only adversely affects the Palestinians, instigating militancy and endless violence as we are witnessing day in and day out; the occupation is dangerously eroding Israel's social fabric and moral standing, regardless of what kind of spins are put on it.

Admitting the truth about the occupation is the one bitter pill that none of its supporters wants to swallow. Should we now leave it to the demagogues who concoct utterly illogical scenarios to mislead the public about the true nature of the occupation, to which only fools would subscribe?