I just finished writing the following to a Jewish Facebook friend who today made the inevitable comparison between the Shoah and the “Nakba”. It seemed to me worth the trouble to respond, because aside from being a friend whom I admire, he is also a popular local radio host.

Dear M.,

Since say you can already hear the “no comparison - no moral equivalency” cries, allow me to amplify them.

The Shoah happened because the Europeans wanted to get rid of the Jews. The “Nakba” happened for the same reason. Except this time the Jews were in a position to fight back, and, miraculously, win.

The newborn State of Israel was immediately attacked by all of its neighbors. The “Nakba” was a direct result, not of Israelis trying to wipe out all the Arabs, but of Jewish self-defense. If Israel had been allowed to develop in peace, there would have been no “Nakba” to speak of.

The Arabs, with the Palestinians as their cat’s paw, still want to rid what they consider to be a central and eternal part of the Muslim Ummah of the “stain” and “dishonor” of the Jewish State of Israel. There is no whitewashing that away. It is a central part of Arab religious and political identity. To pretend otherwise is to willfully blind yourself to the most basic reality in the Middle East.

You may say that the Partition of Palestine was a mistake, and that the Jews should have gone elsewhere. But where? There was no more logical place for them to go but their ancient homeland, where they had lived continuously for millennia, with no period of time when they were not present. America was not going to take hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees, nor was any other country on earth. In fact, one of the main reasons partition found support here was to keep “them” out. The whole bloody history since then is a result of this plain fact.

I can already hear the cries of “Zionist mouthpiece”, so let me preempt them by saying that I am not Jewish, nor a “Christian Zionist”, but I have been to Israel twice, and toured the West Bank, and I have made it my business to read about these things since I was twelve.