e entitled to their own independent state, in the interests of preserving peace and justice.
If Israel's general way of life enables Jewish practices - such as Sabbath observance, or Kosher food - to be followed without great difficulty or inconvenience, then it will be equally easy to accommodate the traditions of other Israelis, notably Muslims and Christians.
And if issues such as social justice, health care, the environment, abortion, religious pluralism, treatment of minorities, and international relations in peace and war, could not effectively be addressed under "Diaspora" conditions from a Jewish perspective by the Jewish leadership (as in Canada), they could easily be studied in Israel without undermining the rights of any other religious or cultural group.
When Diaspora Palestinians return to Israel, many religious and secular Israeli Jews will find allies among dedicated Palestinian Muslims and Christians. And the difficult question of how far religious law - not just religious values - may become the law of the state, will be debated by all who live in the state of Israel.
But what about the Jewish religious claim that Israel is the exclusive Promised Homeland given by God (and human politics) to the Jews?
Since 1973, a major debate in Israel has centered on the question of whether Israel should ever withdraw from the Occupied Territories that are historically Palestinian.
In 1980, Shilo Refael, a dayan (judge) of the rabbinical court in Jerusalem, published some research papers on this topic, as well as on the treatment of minorities according to halakhah, for a religious peace movement called Oz Veshalom. Listed at the front of the booklet is a summary of the halakhic rulings (in Islamic terminology this would be called a "fatwa") as agreed on by Refael and the then-Sefardic Chief Rabbi of Israel, Ovadiah Yosef.
The summary reads in part as follows: "According to the majority of early authorities, 'they shall not dwell in your land' [Exodus 23:33] does not refer to Muslims, since they are not idolaters. All authorities agree that nowadays, when Israel does not have power to drive out nations from the land, the prohibition 'they shall not dwell in your land' has no application. According to many of the greatest authorities, both early and late, the prohibition '1o tehanem' [Deuteronomy 7:27] applies only to idolaters."
Finally, it should be stressed here that Jewish intelligentsia abroad, including those in Canada, no longer have the luxury of rejecting from the sidelines the Palestinian Right-of-Return, nor the full Israeli withdrawal of the Occupied Territories captured in 1967, including Arab East Jerusalem.
As a Canadian Muslim, I sincerely long and pray for peace and justice in the region. This is based on my own personal experience as an eyewitness of the 1956 Israeli invasion of Egypt, the 1967 Israeli attack on Egypt, the Egyptian-Israeli war of attrition of 1968-70, and as an active observer of the Israeli-Arab conflict since my immigration to Canada more than 30 years ago.