Reply #38: you're right, it is far too widespread in Israel.

[Shaktimaan]

And unfortunately it's also far too widespread in Israel. I don't know or particularly care which level is worse, as it's all equally disgusting. It's not a fringe thing when the Chief Rabbi of Israel is supporting a lunatic like that, nor when MK's support it. If it just politics to support such people, then there's something really sick about politics.

See I do disagree with you here though. I don't find it all equally disgusting. To be honest I don't know enough about these Rabbis or MKs to really say what they were thinking. Knowing nothing, it appeared to me that the Chief Rabbi stepped into a crazy situation where these supporters are going nuts and threatening violence (which I'm sure they would have no problem fulfilling), and he basically paid him some lip service before pleading for calm.

While these guys are truly frightening I still don't see them as anything near to the equivalent of their Palestinian counterparts.

How do you come to that conclusion? What do you define as terrorism? Isn't attacking Palestinian civilians considered to be terrorism? If so, there's endless examples of extremist settlers doing it in the West Bank....

Actually I don't know. That's a really great question. When does something qualify as merely a hate crime and when is it truly an act of terrorism?