GENERALLY SPEAKING

• I SUPPORT THE RIGHT OF ISRAEL TO EXIST AND TO DEFEND ITSELF.

• I DO NOT SUPPORT HAMAS, NOR DO I TRUST ANYTHING THAT HAMAS SAYS.  I ALSO DO NOT HAVE MUCH LOVE FOR THE ISRAELI LIKUD PARTY (OR ITS FAR-RIGHT ALLIES).

• I SUPPORT THE TWO-STATE PEACE SOLUTION.  THIS MEANS (AMONG OTHER THINGS) ENDING THE ISRAELI-BACKED OCCUPATION, THE ILLEGAL SETTLEMENTS AND ENSURING THAT BOTH ISRAELIS AND PALESTINIANS CAN PEACEFULLY COEXIST WITHIN A FRAMEWORK OF REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY, SECURITY, RESPECT FOR HUMAN RIGHTS AND FUNDAMENTAL FREEDOMS.

By all means, we should condemn Hamas for their atrocities and seek their destruction as we would the Ku Klux Klan. Yet, the only way to finally end this nightmare of violence, poverty, hatred, and intolerance is to think beyond “Pro-Israeli” or “Pro-Palestinian” bumper sticker slogans and think about how to develop both nations so that all their people live with shared prosperity, strong democratic institutions, and a more tolerant culture.

Most Palestinians and Israelis want entirely legitimate things from their respective governments and, with few exceptions, said governments have failed to deliver.

Hamas cannot deliver the legitimate demands of the Palestinian people because it does not believe in a two-state solution. They do not believe in tolerance or the niceties of liberal democracy. Their end goal is clear; a vast, theocratic, right-wing empire that would offer its people only obedience and death.

The Israeli people are more centrist, even moderately progressive in their politics than the current government, but the voters keep choosing the right-wing governments out of a genuine fear for their security.

Israelis have a right to live peacefully in their own democratic nation, just as do the Palestinian people. The security concern of Israelis is not simply campaign rhetoric from the Israeli right wing. There is a segment of Palestinians and citizens of regional Arab nations that do want to wipe Israel off the map and kill Jewish people as well as anyone that is not a morally upright follower of Orthodox Islam.

Yet, I resist the urge to label myself, “Pro-Israeli” or "Pro-Palestinian" because the conversation that derives from such bumper sticker labels tends to obscure what has to happen in order to respect the human rights of all Israeli and Palestinian people.

My profile picture on social media is the word, “Peace” in Arabic, English, and Hebrew. Yet, I would probably wince at being labeled “Pro-Peace” because as important as the peace process is to end the suffering of the Israelis and the Palestinians, the development challenge goes much deeper than Israel giving up land for peace in order to create an independent Palestinian nation.

Peace requires something more, something that bumper sticker slogans do not capture well. It requires the development of the two nations that are not just independent, and no longer killing each other, but democratic and secure in the broad sense.

Simply put, all Israelis and all Palestinians, no matter their ethnicity, color, creed, party membership, class, disability, sex, or sexual affiliation, are born free and equal. Peace requires not just changes in laws, borders, and social attitudes, but a culture whereby everyone has genuine hope that peace means having a better standard of living for themselves and their children.

FANACTICS HAVE AN EASIER TIME GETTING ON THE FRONT PAGE.

FARGO FORUM.  NEWSPAPER.  MARCH 8TH, 2019.

I suspect that Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., was raised with a certain level of anti-Semitism, not unlike many Christians and Jews who have been raised with a certain level of prejudice against Muslims .

I am a white , Jewish American. I grew up in an expatriate community in Saudi Arabia where, from a very early age, I interacted with other people who did not share my race, religion, ethnic or national background. Cultural diversity was the mundane norm.

Long before I learned who Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was in high school, I took for granted that prejudice directed at fellow Americans or foreigners was not rational. This is not a conventional experience.

Many Americans, Christian and Jewish alike, grow up being taught that most Muslims are barbaric and uncivilized. That progressive voices in the Muslim world do not exist and that Israel should never be held accountable for its treatment of Palestinians. Many Muslims grow up with a similar set of prejudices that are equally untrue.

Many Muslims, of various nations, are taught that Christians are infidels and Jews are evil. That progressive voices in the Christian and Jewish world do not exist and that terrorist acts done in the name of Palestinian Liberation should be supported. This is prejudice divorced from reality.

The reality is that progressive-minded people of all faiths do exist, but fanatics and reactionaries have an easier time making the front page.

The reality is that all human beings can lay claim to the rights described in the International Bill of Human Rights.

The reality is that all governments should be judged on how well they live up to the principles of liberal democracy.