I think the point we were trying to make was that the Palestinians are operating on a slightly different moral plane. Maybe not higher. Maybe not lower. But different.

Ask a few questions. I don't have the answers to all of these, but if you find the answers, it may be instructive.

- How many times have the Israeli military set out to DELIBERATELY kill as many innocent civilians as possible? It's a lousy thing to have your house bulldozed, but not nearly as lousy as being shredded by high explosives.

- Is shredding civilians with high explosives an appropriate response to having to show a pass at a border, or the other many impositions on Palestinians that the Israelis apparently use to persecute them?

- As for the many Palestinians that have been killed, how many were attacking soldiers at the time? How many were throwing rocks, or firing bullets, at tanks?

- Of the Israelis shredded by high explosives in malls, churches, schools, buses, etc., how many were attacking Palestinians at the time with rocks or machine guns? How many had EVER physically attacked a Palestinian? How many belonged to the military?

Here's one for extra credit. Knowledge of past behavior is useful here.

- The Palestinians stop the terror bombing, completely. At least a year goes by. Maybe two. How would the Israelis respond? Would they still be running tanks into Palestinian areas? Would they crack down on Palestinians even worse? Would they increase or decrease the arrests? Would they be more or less likely to negotiate?

- Now. The Israelis buy the Saudi Peace Plan lock, stock and barrel. All Israeli citizens move back to the pre-1967 borders. The settlements in the new Palestinian territory are abandoned, or destroyed. The tanks go home. The soldiers leave. The Palestinians now have all the land they had then. As if the 1967 war had never happened.

Do the Palestinian bombings stop?

The current leadership of the Palestinians, of which Arafat is just part, will accept nothing less than the entire region of Palestine, swept free of the Jews. This is a hard, solid fact, obvious to anyone. Deny this, and you expose yourself as either a hypocrite or an idiot.

I don't know what the Israelis will finally accept. I know their own extinction is not considered an option.

Everything else has to take these facts into account, including attempts to put the Palestinians on the moral high ground. They didn't even exist as a separate people until they were politically created and imprisoned in camps to serve Arab interests.

My own personal opinion is that this battle will end when one or the other is either annihilated, or driven out of the area forever. I don't have to like it, but that's the way it is.

And, just because no one is defending a particular point of view doesn't mean that you have to. It's possible the point of view is wrong.