[The following, by Israelinurse, is crossposted from CiF Watch.]

I have just read your latest offering in the Guardian's 'Comment is Free'. Despite (or because of) my English upbringing, one of the things I cherish most about the Israeli people is their directness and their ability to cut to the chase, so I hope you have not forgotten the all-important words in Hebrew 'dugri' and 'tachless' because I do not intend to beat about the bush too much.

The decision to live in Israel or not is, of course, entirely yours. The decision to use your Israeli nationality as some sort of badge or certificate which supposedly gives you the moral authority to preach to those of us who actually live here - and don't just have the tee-shirt - is something else, and a subject which I feel is legitimate for public discussion. I will not grace your words by calling them 'chutzpa' but instead point out the dangerous and insidious manner in which you attempt to divide us into categories of 'good Jews' and 'bad Jews' by writing the following:

As you know very well, Israel is a small country in which the degrees of separation are minimal. Everybody knows everybody else, and information travels fast. Last night I heard from a member of my extended family who is a friend of one of the soldiers injured and currently in hospital after the events onboard the Mavi Marmara. He told of a soldier hit on the head with an axe with such force that his helmet was split into two and his skull fractured. He told of another soldier who was stabbed in the stomach with a knife some 30 or 40 centimetres long which penetrated the entire width of his body and came out the other side. Any decent person, never mind Israeli citizen Daphna, is shocked by these displays of horrific violence. Anyone who has seen the footage of Shayetet 13 being brutally beaten with metal bars understands perfectly well that the manner and force with which those weapons -and that is what they were- were wielded show beyond any doubt that the perpetrators were as far removed from peace and humanitarian concerns as it is possible to be. Do you remember the footage of the terrible lynch of the two Israeli reservists who lost their way in Ramallah in the year 2000?

The people who committed that atrocity were filled with the same hatred and contempt for human life as displayed by the activists on your revered 'peace ship'. I hardly think you have an inch of moral ground on which to stand if you now define people as decent according to their support for such inhuman actions.

If you actually lived here Daphna, then maybe you would understand that the reservist in Ramallah could have been your husband and the soldier coming down the rope onto the deck of the Mavi Marmara straight into the hands of a crowd baying for his blood could have been your son or brother. Israelis understand that very well, which is why in times of grave danger to our security, we for the most part put politics aside and concentrate upon the essential things we have to do in order for our children to live as normal lives as possible. We have also been in this tough neighbourhood long enough to understand the dangers which confront us, including those from within, so your attempts to paint Anat Kam, Uri Blau, Ameer Makhoul and Omar Saeed in the pastel tones of the wronged will not work on us. Unlike the average Guardian reader (and obviously yourself) we will wait patiently for the results of the judicial process before pronouncing judgment or accusing our government of wrongdoing.

Your employment of highly inflammatory phrases such as 'murderous carnage' and the Nazi analogy 'Weimar republic' is not only highly offensive, but clearly indicates that you have ventured far beyond the point of legitimate criticism. Israelis are not in need of ex-pats to tell us how or why to criticize our politicians; maybe you have been away too long to remember that this is something of a national sport in Israel. And if you seriously think, as I can only presume you do because you wrote it, that aligning yourself with the people who died on board the Gaza flotilla and backing them is the right thing to do, then I'm afraid that it is your moral compass which is in urgent need of repair.

You are lucky enough to have been born into one Western democracy and to be living in another. To take that gift for granted by lending your support to an ideology which is based upon the repression of women, homosexuals, apostates, Jews, Christians and others is to betray the millions of people in this world who would give anything to be as fortunate as you are, including many who are at present living under the shadow of the fascist Hamas regime which for some inexplicable reason you appear to romanticize. Those who died onboard the Gaza flotilla are supporters of an Islamist terror movement with the aim of resurrecting a global Caliphate. Last week a Hamas leader praised Turkey for taking the lead on that front. Maybe since you studied Arabic in primary school it has become a little rusty, but it would be a good idea to find out exactly to whom and what you are lending your voice before you pass judgment on the decency -or otherwise- of others.

I too hope for a better future for both Israelis and Palestinians in this region, but supporting people who have such contempt for the lives and rights of others is not the way it will come about. If, in your eyes that makes me an indecent person, then 'dugri', I prefer to stay that way. At least, unlike you, I won't have sold myself out for the sake of an adjective.