No doubt a great sense of their nationalist pride comes from their religion...even if they may not be very religious. I'm not denying that the religious overtones are there. I'm just saying it is but the shallowest of examinations to insist that this evil is visited upon us because of religion. This is evil people exploiting religion and using it as leverage to do evil things.
On Benjamin Netanyahu, I don't believe I've ever heard him referred to as a moderate...but I'm not sure that matters in this context.
Well, that I'm able to call Netanyahu more moderate than certain members of his cabinet is a pretty damning indictment of the current Israeli government.
I think there was a period in the 60s and 70s when the Palestinian national cause was legitimately separated from religion. The Cold War cast a shadow over the world, it was trendy to be a secular nationalist fighting "colonial" powers. Arafat was no Islamist. His only wife is a Christian. The PFLP is a Marxist organization founded by a Palestinian Christian. The Islamic Revolution in Iran changed the dynamic, and there is a broad perception that secular parties failed to achieve anything. Fatah runs the PA and has been crying to the world for years now about Israel expanding settlements in the West Bank, and the West and the US are largely silent. The Israeli right would absolutely prefer Palestinians to be wholly represented by Hamas, and to an extent I'd argue they've deliberated undermined the secular groups for that exact reason. Easier to go to the US and the West for support when you can argue you're fighting ISIS-like terrorists and not secular nationalists asking merely for the right of self-determination. Nowadays Hamas, the Islamic Resistance Movement, dominates the issue. No way around it.
This is evil people exploiting religion and using it as leverage to do evil things.
Yes, and that's the thing about religion. Who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities