The idea of creating a purely Jewish state in Palestine is a call to abandoning over two millennia of human progress by recreating the ancient social conditions that prevailed under Pax-Romana (the Roman Peace).

The Roman Peace that set the rule through which Rome governed other nations is vividly described by Rome’s greatest poet Virgil in the Aeneid: “O Roman! Remember by your strength to rule Earth’s peoples… To spare the conquered and crush the proud.” This was the rule that brought ruin and destruction to ancient Jerusalem and Palmyra and led to the persecution of early Christians.

The Roman way was embraced in modern times by Eruopean colonialism which brought death and misery to their colonial subjects, and was finally defeated in the aftermath of WWII.

Netanyahu and his settlers have decided to embrace the Roman way in dealing with the Palestinians: You either submit to our one-sided rule or we will destroy your cities and towns and make your life miserable.

What the settler’s movement fails to under is the fact that they are not living in the ancient time when the prevailed motto was “might makes right,” by in a modern time informed by the monotheistic ethos that taught humanity the principle of equal dignity of all peoples, and the moral duty of speaking truth to power and fighting arrogance and corruption.