God's Warriors

In August 2007, CNN presented a three-part documentary "God's Warriors," which featured extremist elements in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The Israel Lobby immediately complained since apparently in their view Jewish extremists are not extreme. Indeed, the Israel Lobby sees nothing wrong with fanatic Jewish "settlers" building colonies in occupied Palestinian land even though this is against international law, UN resolutions, and the Geneva Convention.

UN Security Council Resolution 242 (November 22, 1967) reads "Emphasizing the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war" and calls for "withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict." (See Jimmy Carter's book "Palestine Peace Not Apartheid" p. 217-218) Amazingly, the Israel Lobby claims that this UN resolution only calls for withdrawal from some, not all, of the occupied Palestinian territory! The Lobby's interpretation is ridiculous and clearly goes against the spirit of not only the UN resolution but of the UN Charter as well. The resolution does not read "Emphasizing the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war sometimes or to some extent"! It obviously means that such acquisition is never admissible.

Furthermore, the Fourth Geneva Convention "forbids an occupying power from transferring any parts of its civilian population into territories seized by military force."(See Carter p. 193) Therefore, Israel should return to the 1967 borders and evacuate the apartheid settlements, all of which are illegal under international law.

The religious zealots exposed in this excellent documentary claim that the Bible justifies their illegal and violent acts. Such people must be denounced no matter what religion they practice. In the media we hear loud calls for Muslims to speak out against Muslim radicals, but where are the calls for Jews to speak out against Jewish radicals? Incidentally, the next time I saw this series on TV, only the two parts on Christian and Muslim extremists were shown.