Steve,

Tom Robbins wrote, 'Religion is not merely the opium of the masses, it's the cyanide."

As for the current Godless acquisition of wealth and power and territory, all in the name of religion?

The only hope for this region, and perhaps all religious-fuelled 'wars', almost always driven by 'rabid' zealots, has to be UN monitored and mandated.

And Truth and Reconciliation may be a start.

We're trying it here in Canada with our Indigenous Peoples, it's been difficult but we have made significant progress, have been since 1998, and Nelson Mandala used it to combat the legacy of South Africa's apartheid regime.

First truth:

The Palestinians had nothing to do with the Holocaust. Zero.

Second truth:

Besides international funding, Israel was founded in large part through the efforts of these fanatical terrorist organizations: The Haganah, The Irgun, and The Lehi. and later after a split, the Stern Gang.

They assassinated, they bombed and they massacred: mostly Arabs but some British soldiers were also murdered.

These violent tenets were of course set in religious stone in the decades before the Holocaust, especially during the Zionist Congress Assemblies, (1897-1939), and were enacted in the lead up to Independence.

The 1948 massacre in the Arab village of Dier Yassin is just one example and one that continues to this day in the occupied territories in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Third Truth:

" Israel has violated 28 resolutions of the United Nations Security Council (which are legally binding on member-nations U.N. Charter, Article 25 (1945); a few sample resolutions - 54, 111, 233, 234, 236, 248, 250, 252, 256, 262, 267, 270, 280, 285, 298, 313, 316, 468, 476."

"Since 2015, the General Assembly has adopted 140 resolutions criticizing Israel, mainly over its treatment of the Palestinians, its relationships with neighboring countries and other alleged wrongdoings."

And the US had better heed the UN, and stop vetoing the General Assembly, as the Arab world will continue to move even closer to China, Russia and Iran.

Truth and Reconciliation is perhaps the only way out of the cycle and calling for one is not Anti-Semitic or pro-Palestinian...its a call for as you point out 'peace and mercy and goodness' and not for a rapidly escalating process which will mean another bitter dose of cyanide for us all: be it in the form of Muslim Hamas orchestrated massacres or Jewish Israeli bombings.

Thanks for another much needed article.