Lisa, You know what I find interesting. Liza, Yael and Allison who seem to share your viewpoint about the conference , well I am not sure about Liza but the rest of those bloggers as well as yourself originally came from North America. Also, unless I am mistaken all of you come from in or around Tel Aviv which for at least now is out of reach of your enemies missiles and isn't really on the front line of the conflict. My point is I feel that all of you are seeing things from a North American perspective – viewing events and attitudes as if they were occurring in North America instead of Israel. And living where you are living you can for the most part maintain an illusion of normalcy. You can easily maintain the perspective that Israel is just like any Western County and therefore can behave the same way as say Canada or the United States Well, that is simply not the case. Israel is a small country surrounded by people who want to exterminate you. You are at constant war. Therefore you must start thinking of someone who is in that situation. In the Middle East Israel is an abnormality . It is a modern state surrounded by societies who haven't changed in thousands of years and who have a very savage view on the value of life. I know on one level you know you aren't in Toronto anymore, but have you really fully taken that into your being? One of the responders to this post mentioned David Duke who is an American living in America who in the past had very offensive things to say about other people in the United States. Viewing it from an American perspective where the people he is trying to denigrate aren't for the most part hostile, aren't trying to annihilate him and his family it is understandable why he should be viewed with disdain. But within a country like Israel, where Arabs as a culture have made it the focus of their lives to kill Jews, surely it isn't racism to acknowledge what these people are and hate them for it. No, you are still in an North American paradigm. You must realize at your core that Israel isn't Toronto, understand what that means, and adjust your mindset to meet the realities of living in a country at constant war surrounded by enemies whose focus in life is to exterminate you from this planet.