I think this is a very modern and moderate reflection on Jewish traditions and values. The author manages not to fall into the pit of cultural relativism, but I think the author needs only to look at the situation in Gaza, to see why the security reasoning is still valid to some extent. Furthermore this cause for security concerns are only present because of the tension at this very moment. If the tension was relieved or changes were beginning to show inside Palestinian terretory itself, then the military would have some grounds for revising their tactical stance on this subject.

The time has come to speak the truth and nothing but the truth!

And if somebody has more arguments besides security and history/religion, we'll make those too.

of the place you r living in. Judea as the Juda tribe, there is no such plach as palestinemaybe phelistin wich also wasn't located in the plac you r living in. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:12_staemme_israels.png http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Jerusalem-coat-of-arms.svg the symbol of jerusalem is lion it is also the symbol of the Judea tribe. how about that.

Israel was the one to initiate the withdraw from gaza but than the palis started to shoot rockets on innocent civilians, so everything go to full stop. and not going to renew ever if that is the meaning of withdrawing. 6000 rockets=withdraw. than never again.

there are sectors of the population that are not Jewish (some from the FSU), and others that have been de-Judeized by secular education and media. In addition there are the religiously observant liberal Israelis who just want to be loved by the rest of the world and who cringe daily at the bad press Jews get due to the “occupation”. The Biblical appeal just does not work with them. We have read many accounts of former supporters of the Disengagement who now speak out against further land withdrawals because of security reasons. They have realized that offering the Arabs all that land, complete with state-of-the-art greenhouses, brought them nothing but Kassams in gratitude. So while you are absolutely right about the reasons why Jews belong to that land, and that land belongs to the Jews, Israel is a democracy and you need every possible vote to elect a government that will uphold right wing values. This Prime Minister has been forced into asserting at least some Jewish values, such as the indivisibility of Jerusalem, and this has been an achievement of sorts…. considering that the same Prime Minister’s original preference was to set up a coalition government with Kadima. It is thanks to the right wing vote as a whole that the Land of Israel supporters hold this much clout. And some of those votes were from people who voted right wing just because they had grown sick of what the left had brought to the country, not out of some deeply held spiritual value. You must appeal to those voters with practical arguments. We would have felt so proud had the Prime Minister stood up to the pressures by the US government and declared that Jews had the legal, historical and spiritual right to live in Judea and Samaria. But Netanyahu is a practical man and he thought his best political choice was to try to make everyone happy. Which he didn’t. The right wing will not forgive him for conceding the most important point, the reason why Jews belong in Judea and Samaria. And of course, while Obama seemed partly mollified by his acceptance of another Arab state, we know that he will continue a relentless pressure on Israel to give up every one of those demands. As you say, “the prime minister's stated conditions for the establishment of such a state – Arab recognition of Israel as Jewish state and an eventual demilitarized Palestinian state – will quickly be sidestepped or forgotten”. But we must not be too pessimistic. There will be another election in Israel, and right wing politicians should be working on their campaign right now, preparing their own Peace Plan and reaching out to all Israelis - whether religious or secular - and using arguments that apply best to those voters: the Bible or security, or both. After all, it’s is a country for all kinds of Israelis. You need each other right now. You need to be united in the love for the land, whichever reasons you may have. (Note to Moderator: this TB contains no incitement, no insults, no slander. I hope it goes through this time. Thank you.)

"Therefore, anyone [...] who really cares about the Jewish people and the divine mission they've been entrusted with..." I would assume an extremely small portion of the population believes the divine factor to be relevant. It seems most of the religious parties will gladly accept cash and/or yeshiva budgets in exchange for supporting "x" party's political agenda (even a two state solution).

they are people. we dont believe in "your mission". in fact we've seen plenty of it lately AIG....oh and the b***h (what ever the hell her name is) that was caught in phone conversations passing sensitive US info to israel. patriot act my a**, what exactly was in their heads for passing the unleashing of the china-like system....maybe to arabs, who knows, them jewish charity people, etc. everybody is human, yes, and that is what the "jewish" people are. i dont think ya'll need acedemics on ya'll's side, I was talking to Amy Kaplan just today-funny how conversations swerve to politics here. Anyway, good luck finding the incentive. We'll be patient for that too..."anything other than the truth will not hold up"....something is slowly not holing up here; this is the holy land.

Thank you for your comments. Just to clarify, I don't disregard the security argument because obviously there is a lot of truth to it. However, if this is the ONLY argument (I think I made this point a few times in the article) then we're setting ourselves up for a fall. Obviously not everyone connects to or fully understands the deeper/religious meaning of the Land of Israel. Nonetheless, the more these 'loftier' ideas are written about and talked about, the more they will enter into the mindset of the nation, something which I'm sure can only help.

This kind of thinking is the kind of thinking that is going to choke an independent jewish state on the palestinian population. if a reasonable security arrangement can be made, it is MUCH more preferable to have a smaller country than to become a minority. the fact that your article ignores completely the large palestinian population speaks volumes.

There are a number of reasons, all of which are important, for not surrendering land. Most importantly, Israel was promised to the Jewish people by G-d, and there has been a Jewish presence in this land for thousands of years. Israel, including Judea and Samaria, is Jewish land, and giving it to the Palestinians is a blatant violation of Jewish law. Many leading Rabbis such as the Lubavitcher Rebbe have ruled that it is unacceptable to surrender land. Now to the security argument. This is a very important argument, because even though this land is Jewish land, there are many security/military consequences of giving it up. Every time that Israel has withdrawn from land, there have been negative security consequences. Israel withdrew from South Lebanon, look what happened. Hizbullah now controls this area and has used it to carry out rocket attacks. Israel withdrew from Gaza, then Hamas took over and used the area to carry out rocket attacks. Even in the Sinai, the lack of an Israeli security presence and the incompentence of UN 'soldiers' has allowed arms smugglers to send many weapons into Gaza. If Israel withdraws from Judea and Samaria, at some point Hamas will take control because its forces are stronger than those of Fatah. Hamas will then be able to relatively easily fire rockets into Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Haifa, Netanya and other major cities. Hamas could even hit Ben-Gurion Airport. Tourism would plummet if the airport was getting hit by rockets and this would hurt the economy greatly. The Arabs hate our guts. They want to destroy us. They want to succeed where Hitler failed. Giving them more land only helps their cause.

iman said .. it is our land not jewish land .... he said it is jewish land but we must take it by force .... i understanded he wanted to say ... to believe on your right you need high power and the palastinians believe on it

#12,IN CHICAGO USA WE IGNORED THE LARGE ARAB POPULATION ALSO. THE AMERICANS JUST DIDNT WANT TO GIVE AWAY CHICAGO OR A FEW OTHER ARAB ENCLAVES TO THOSE ARABS,, EVEN THOUGH THEY COMPROMISE A LARGE PORTION OF THE POPULATION. AND INSPITE OF PROOF THAT THE ARABS REALLY MIGRATED FROOM NEIGHBORING CITIES AND LANDS...SOME PEOPLE BELIEVE THAT CHICAGO SHOULD BE GVEN *BACK* TO THE ARABS. PERSONALLY I THINK WE AMERICANS SHOULD GIVE *BACK* CHICAGO... IN THE INTEREST OF PEACE.... EVEN THOUGH THE ORIGINAL *SETTLERS* OF CHICAGO WOULD HAVE TO LOSE THEIR HERITAGE AND POSSESSIONS.... EVEN THOUGH THE ANCIENT RECORDS PROVE THE ARABS DIDNT LIVE IN CHICAGO... USA CITIZENS SHOULD IN THE INTEREST OF ''PEACE'' GIVE *BACK* CHICAGO.. BECAUSE WHEN YOU THINK OF IT... OTHERWISE THOSE ARABS FROM CHICAGO WOULD WANT TO MOVE TO NEW JERSEY,, SO THE KING OF JERSEY IS PETITIONING THE REST OF THE NRIGHBORS FOR THE ARABS TO HAVE CHICAGO IN EXCHANGE FOR PEACE..... IN REFERENCE TO SIZE.... WILL YOU SUPPORT THE BILL THAT THE ORIGINAL *SETTLERS** GET CONDUMS TO PREVENT HAVING BABIES BECAUSE OF A SHORTAGE OF ROOM FOR BABIES TO GROW AND HAVE BABIES..? BETTER YET WILL YOU SUPPORT ABORTION OR INFANTICIDE ? OR BETTER YET WILL YOU SUPPORT DEATH IF THE BABY IS A GIRL SO AS NOT TO NATURAL GROW ..? DAN YOU SHOULD BE A LIVING EXAMPLE AND GIVE YOUR HOME TO AN ARAB... YOU ALREADY HAVE IN ESSENCE SUPPORTED GIVING YOUR FIRST BORN TO THE ARABS. DAN I SUGGEST YOU NO LONGER TAKE GENERIC MEDICATION.. ITS NOT WORKING.. OH DANNY....... SO MUCH YOU HAVE TO LEARN.. FIRST YOU HAVE TO OPEN YOUR MIND TO HISTORY PAST AND PRESENT..TO REASON AND TO LOGIC... DACON9 jewswithviews@gmail.com