You wrote: (my replies in caps in between)

He likes to speak “as a Jew” yet is connection to Jewishness or Judaism is tenuous at best.
He knows no language spoken by Jews be it Yiddish (the language of the Ashkenazim,

MY MOTHER WAS BROUGHT UP SPEAKING YIDDISH, MY FATHER’S GRANDFATHER WHO HELPED BRING UP ONLY SPOKE YIDDISH. AS A RESULT, MY PARENTS BOTH SPOKE PLENTY OF YIDDISH AT HOME IN THE 1950s AND I KNOW MANY WORDS AND PHRASES.
Ladino, the language of Spharad, Mizrachi, the language of middle eastern Jews, of Hebrew, the language of modern Israel), he shows no extensive knowledge of Jewish history and culture. What then makes him a Jew?
YOU CAN WRITE HERE WHAT YOU THINK ‘MAKES’ SOMEONE A JEW. I HAD NO IDEA THAT WHAT WAS REQUIRED WAS AN ‘EXTENSIVE KNOWLEDGE OF JEWISH HISTORY AND CULTURE’, AS IF YOU NEEDED SOME KIND OF QUALIFICATION OR DEGREE IN JEWISH HISTORY TO BECOME A JEW! HOW ABSURD. AS IT HAPPENS, I’VE IMMERSED MYSELF SEVERAL TIMES IN MY LIFE IN VARIOUS ASPECTS OF JEWISH HISTORY AND CULTURE BUT SO WHAT?

Is he connected to the Jewish community in England? His mention of the Jewish press was critical as if they too had no right to exist unless they followed his Trotskyite views.

THERE ISN’T ONE ‘JEWISH COMMUNITY’ IN ENGLAND. THERE ARE MANY. I AM SOMETIMES CONNECTED TO SOME OF THEM.

Michael is a self declared Jew who uses this label in order to justify his attacks on other Jews. Having Jewish parents does not automatically make one a Jews otherwise the former Bishop of Paris whose parents were also Jewish would have died a Jew, which he didn’t.

YOU ARE NOW GETTING BOTH CARRIED AWAY AND OFFENSIVE. PLENTY OF JEWS WHO HAD CONVERTED TO CHRISTIANITY OR TO NO RELIGION WERE HUNTED AND DOWN AND PERISHED DURING THE THIRD REICH. I DO PLENTY OF THINGS THAT I DON’T NEED TO SPECIFY TO YOU WHICH AREN’T PREDICATED ON THE IDEA OF ‘AS A JEW’. THIS IS JUST A FEEBLE INSULT THAT CIRCULATES AMONGST THOSE WHO LOATHE ANTI-ZIONIST JEWS IN ORDER TO EXPLAIN US AWAY. IT’S LIKE A FOLK MEME THAT YOU KEEP REPEATING. YOU HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO NEED WHATSOEVER TO READ ANYTHING I HAVE WRITTEN, BUT THERE ARE PLENTY OF ASPECTS IN MY WRITING FOR CHILDREN WHICH ARE ABOUT, OR USE, OR DRAW UPON THE SPECIFIC KIND OF JEWISH CULTURE THAT I WAS BROUGHT UP IN. IT’S A ALWAYS A GOOD IDEA, YOU KNOW, TO SHARE KNOWLEDGE, BUT KEEP YOUR IGNORANCE TO YOURSELF. I, FOR ONE, WILL NEVER, EVER BLAME PEOPLE FOR IGNORANCE, BUT IF YOU DISPLAY YOUR IGNORANCE AS A VIRTUE, AND USE IGNORNANCE TO HIT PEOPLE OVER THE HEAD WITH IT, I SAY POLITELY AND NICELY GO FUCK YOURSELF OR AS MY FATHER WOULD SAY, ‘CHALIERA ZOLSTE NIMMEN’ OR ‘CHAPP ‘N CHALIERA’ OR ‘OISS GERISSEN ZOLSTE VEREN’ OR ”CH’A’ DICH IM LOCH’. TAKE YOUR PICK.

Ramell’s comment on the BBC (non – so far) Gaza appeal is more worrying especially as there was absolutely no evidence of any intervention by Israel or pro Israelis whatsoever.

See Israelinurse’ss post above yours. Here she says that most Israelis support a two state solution. Assuming there is no reason to disbelieve her and that you accept at least, that as a democracy the Israeli people can make their views clear through the ballot box, why should there be any need for formaldehyde at all?

Answer rather why at every point at which there has looked like being any hope of peace between Israel and the Arabs the answer of the Islamist extremists in particular has been to intensify terrorism?

The disengagement is actually formaldehyde. It supplies the amount of formaldehyde that’s necessary so that there will not be a political process with the Palestinians.”

Dov Weisglass, top adviser to Sharon during disengagement.

Lots of Muslims object to allegedly anti-Palestinian British policies, they describe themselves as ‘kin’ to Palestinian Muslims, yet also claim to be loyal British citizens.

Michael believes there is one rule for British Jews and one for everyone else. Jews are to him the eternal dhimmis in this world.

Not in the sense of an axis of allegiance that transcends that to the UK. Lots of groups express or play on a sense of kinship to extra-British groups, whether literal or ‘figurative’. Do they all now hold a debt of allegiance that transcends that to their own state?

Lots of Muslims object to allegedly anti-Palestinian British policies, they describe themselves as ‘kin’ to Palestinian Muslims, yet also claim to be loyal British citizens.

such a situation could arise (except, I thought, the British government was already agin the settlements, officially, and, in that sense, such a situation already exists, in terms of views and opinions).

Lots of people demonstrated against the Iraq war: allegiances, anyone?

Lots of people opposed British policy in northern Ireland: does that mean such Anglo-Irish were more loyal to, or had allegiance to, either the Eire Republic or the I.R.A?

You seem to paint things in extremely unsubtle, unnuanced and ultimately un-illuminating black or white.

And “allegiance” does suggest, or imply, I think, a duty of vassal-service.

Michael loves hypotheticals. Too bad he himself doesn’t believe in this hypothetical.

Offer me a hypothetical you yourself believe in and then we can talk.

You don’t live in Israel, Michael, because you don’t need to. For whatever reason. Your ancestors came here and ensured you wouldn’t need to make a choice to live there, whether compelled or not.