In reply to last week's article from the Durham Palestine Solidarity Campaign, David Soakell, North-East representative of the Christian Friends of Israel, gives his side of the arguament about the deteriorating situation in the Holy Land.

THE very right of the Jewish people to their homeland and nation in the land of Israel is being fundamentally assailed today. Many proclaim: "The Palestinians are an Arab people who have lived in and around the Holy Land since before the time of Christ". But there is great need to examine the Arab claim.

During previous history there never has been a "Palestinian Arab" nation. To the Arab people as a whole, no such entity as Palestine existed. They were not conscious of any relationship with the land. How did it come to this? How did it get to the stage that the average person thinks there used to be a Palestinian country governed by Palestinians? Palestinians are mostly Jordanian, Syrian and Egyptian. That great Palestinian leader Arafat was Egyptian.

Many think of Israel (a country the size of Wales) as an apartheid state. If apartheid was in Israel there wouldn't be Arab members of the Knesset (Israel's government). If apartheid was in Israel there wouldn't be Arab justices in the Israeli High Court. There wouldn't be Arab university students studying the same subjects as Israelis. There wouldn't be Jewish doctors treating Arab patients and Arab doctors treating Jewish patients.

Think about it. If apartheid was in Israel, Arab bombers could not get on the same buses as Jews, nor could they use the same cafes. So they couldn't mount suicide bomb attacks in buses and cafes.

There is no apartheid in Israel. The allegation that there is, is a wicked lie. Is there racism in Israel? Sadly, yes. Is there racism in Britain? Sadly, yes. It is there in most countries. The Israeli government policies are in support of the equality of its entire people, regardless of religion, race and sex. Can you find any other country in the Middle East with fairer policies? Do you see this in Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia?

Israel wants peace, hence withdrawing every Jew from their homes in Gaza. But what of Gaza? And what efforts do we see regarding the "promotion of peace" from the Palestinians? With 19 Arabs killed by Arabs in 24 hours this week, Gaza is suffering all-out civil war. This is Arab versus Arab - nothing to do with Israel - a similar picture to events in Iraq and recent events in Lebanon. The fighting in Gaza this week has been intense and brutal with hospitals becoming battlegrounds. A senior Fatah member was shot 41 times while in a hospital bed by Hamas.

In comparison, Israel actually ranks second in quality of university education and first in R&D investment. What does this mean? It is an Israeli-developed processor that powers your computer, most of the Windows XP operating systems were developed by Microsoft-Israel. The Pentium MMX chip technology was designed in Israel at Intel. The Pentium microprocessor in your computer was most likely made in Israel. The mobile phone was developed in Israel by Israelis working in the Israeli branch of Motorola, which has its largest development centre in Israel. Voice mail technology also was developed in Israel. This is why anyone who decides to boycott Israeli goods needs to think carefully about what they are proposing. If you support any boycott of Israel, and if you are to remain intellectually honest, prepare for a radical lifestyle change.