In the comment boxes of Catholic and Enjoying It! I put down an amazed remark wondering if the owner of the blog, Mark Shea, was somehow drifting towards the Sungenis end of an unfortunate spectrum. That was a remark quite definitely (and non-fallaciously)  aimed in an ad hominem way at Mark Shea's own thinking, as expressed by him over the years, and not a general way of bringing up the usual current political issues involving Israel. As such, it didn't get much response. Later in the back and forth shuttle of remarks, Mark had this to say to another commenter:

The swiftness to label every peep of criticism of Israel as anti-semitism is one of the weird tics of American culture. In some theoretical way, it is general acknowledged that Israel could, in some alternate universe, do something wrong. But in actual fact, a considerable number of Americans find it almost impossible to admit it, even when they do something grossly unjust, like the story this blog entry mentions. It's *astounding* how quickly you get tagged as an anti-semite, or a kook, or some other nasty thing if you suggest that Israel is just another secular nation state, capable of all the evil that any secular nation state commits. In America, even Catholics buy into the thoroughly Protestant notion that *this* particular secular nation state is somehow specially ordained by God and is not simply the product of a UN resolution. I refuse to buy that particular bit of bogus theology and view Israel's claims to statehood through the lens of natural law, not supernatural revelation. Israel has all the claims that any other secular nation state has. No less and no more.

And that has consistently been Mark's position. In summary, he holds that (filtering out the exaggerations):

• Israel is just another secular nation state;
• Israel is simply the product of a UN resolution.

And consistently I have never been able to understand how Mark can hold such positions, or where they come from.

Imagine a country where this is true:

The country is Jewish. The majority of people pay mixed or no attention to God. A minority pay great attention to God. The rulers are sometimes religious, and sometimes not. They are criticized heavily. Traditional enemies attack them regularly. They are descendants of Abraham, and the promise given to Abraham is still alive in them. Sometimes there are prophets, and sometimes not.

Is this Israel of 900BC? Or the Israel of today? Is God working in promised ways in one, but not the other? On what grounds do I decide? I think it is clear that I had better get the answer exactly right, else I risk nullifying the Old Testament, or even nullifying the New.

But somehow Mark thinks he has a precise reading on the situation, and can tell that one is really God's Israel, and the other is really not. How he has managed to figure this out I do not understand.