The United States Declaration of Independence · 4 July 1776
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal”
An American founding text, and true everywhere. The Planetary Council's position: there is one race, the human race. Differences in how people look are adaptations to where their ancestors lived, like skin colour to sunlight.
Declaration of Independence, National Archives · Skin colour and sunlight
This page is not neutral. Its agenda: educating people who say “it says in the book”. It was inspired by Israel's war on Gaza, which is why it is mostly about Israel and Palestine.
The 7 October 2023 attack was an atrocity: about 1,200 people killed in Israel, most of them civilians, and 251 taken hostage. Hamas's stated objective was to hit military sites and capture soldiers to exchange for Palestinian prisoners. More than 1,000 days later, Gaza's Ministry of Health reports 74,564 Palestinians killed.
Hamas, Our Narrative, January 2024 · two years later, December 2025 · UN OCHA, 28 October 2026
People are people. Yet again and again someone says: “it says in the book”, “it is not murder, it is a rightful killing”. Which book, translated by whom? That is intellectual gymnastics. This page keeps it simple. Go to the part for Israel.
Last updated 6 November 2026. On a computer, hover or click a line to read about it. On a phone, tap it.
In their own words
Jewish · Mishnah, Sanhedrin 4:5
So nobody can say “my father is greater than your father”. The same passage says destroying one life is like destroying a whole world; the common version adds “from the Jewish people”.
Jewish · Rabbi Jonathan Sacks · The Dignity of Difference, page 51
Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth, 1991 to 2013.
Christian · Paul · Galatians 3:28, King James Bible
Paul means unity in the faith. Jesus went further: Love your enemies (Matthew 5:44).
Christian · Pope Leo XIV · first blessing, 8 May 2025
In 2026 he warned against using faith to bless nationalism or excuse violence.
Christian and Muslim · Pope Francis and the Grand Imam of al-Azhar · Abu Dhabi, 2019
Signed by the heads of the Catholic Church and of al-Azhar, Sunni Islam’s best-known institution.
Muslim · Quran 49:13 · translation by Mustafa Khattab
Spoken to all humanity, not one people.
Muslim · The Prophet Muhammad · Farewell Sermon, 632
From one of several recorded versions of the sermon, translated by Nuh Ha Mim Keller.
Hindu · Bhagavad Gita 5.18 · translation by Prabhupada
A priest and an outcast, the top and bottom of the old caste system, seen the same way.
Hindu · Maha Upanishad 6.71 to 73
The idea known as vasudhaiva kutumbakam: small minds count “mine” and “theirs”, big hearts see one family.
Taoist · Laozi · Tao Te Ching 31
The same chapter says a victory should be treated like a funeral. Translated by James Legge.
Confucian · Confucius · Analects 15.23
His one word to live by: reciprocity. Some editions number it 15.24.
Ubuntu · Archbishop Desmond Tutu · No Future Without Forgiveness, 1999
From the Zulu saying umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu: a person becomes fully human through other people.
Bahá’í · Bahá’u’lláh · 1800s
Rastafari · Emperor Haile Selassie · United Nations, 1963
Until then, he said, there would be no peace. Bob Marley turned the speech into the song “War”; the line “everywhere is war” is Marley’s.
United States · President John F. Kennedy · 10 June 1963
Said about the Soviet Union, months after the Cuban missile crisis.
Everyone · Universal Declaration of Human Rights · Article 1, 1948
Hansa Mehta of India is credited with changing “all men” to “all human beings”.
Science · Russell, Einstein and nine other scientists · 1955
No religion needed.
The catch
The rule and the exception sit side by side. People choose which one wins.
Jewish · Torah · Deuteronomy 20:16
The order covers only the towns of six Canaanite nations named in the next verse; distant towns get an offer of peace first (20:10). Later rabbis ruled those nations had long since disappeared, so the command could no longer be applied.
Should an order about one war, three thousand years ago, guide anyone today?
Muslim · Quran 5:32 · translation by Mustafa Khattab
The verse says every life is worth all of humanity, then allows taking one as punishment for murder or “mischief in the land”. That second phrase is vague, and different groups have stretched it to cover their enemies.
Who decides what counts as mischief, and should the one deciding also hold the weapon?
Hindu · Bhagavad Gita 2.31 · translation by Prabhupada
Krishna says this to the warrior Arjuna, who does not want to fight his own relatives, telling him that fighting is his duty. The translator’s notes add that religious violence is sometimes a necessary factor.
Is a duty to fight still a duty if the war itself is unjust?
Christian · Jesus · Matthew 10:34, King James Bible
The next verses say following him will set families against each other, so most Christians read the sword as that division. Yet the line has been quoted to bless real wars.
When one line can be read two ways, which reading should win?
United States · Declaration of Independence, 1776
The same document that says all men are created equal calls Native Americans savages, and its main author, Thomas Jefferson, owned slaves. Equality was written for some people and not yet for others.
Who is left out of “all men” today?
The fix · Mishnah, Makkot 1:10
Not an exception but a limit on one: the death penalty stayed in the law, but the rabbis made it almost impossible to carry out. A court that executed even once in seven years was called destructive.
Could the exceptions people use in war today be limited the same way?
Real history
Wars usually come from land, money, power and fear. Religion often gives the excuse.
The First Crusade · 1096 to 1099
Jewish communities in Germany were attacked in 1096. Muslims and Jews were killed when Jerusalem fell in 1099.
The Thirty Years' War · 1618 to 1648
Catholic France fought on the Protestant side. An estimated 4.5 to 8 million died.
The Partition of India · 1947
12 to 20 million were forced from their homes. Around 1 million dead is the figure most often used.
The Rohingya · Myanmar, from 2017
Over 700,000 fled to Bangladesh, and at least 6,700 were killed in the first month (Médecins Sans Frontières). The world court rules on genocide on 19 November 2026.
The Lusitania · 1915
About 1,200 died, 128 of them Americans; Germany had published warnings and the ship carried ammunition. American opinion turned, and the United States joined the war in 1917.
9/11 and Iraq · 2001 to 2003
No stockpiles were found, and the 9/11 Commission found no “collaborative operational relationship”. Asking for proof before the bombs fall is not betrayal.
The Good Friday Agreement · 1998
Voters backed it: 71 percent in Northern Ireland, 94 percent in Ireland.
The women of Liberia · 2003
It helped end a 14-year civil war. Leymah Gbowee won the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize.
To Israel, with respect
The fear after 7 October is real, and so is the grief. This is not an attack on Israel or on Jews: it is Jewish tradition, in its own words. Your feedback is especially welcome at planetarycouncil.org.
Many Israelis have paid the highest price and still chosen peace. Vivian Silver, a co-founder of Women Wage Peace, was killed in her home in Be'eri on 7 October. The Parents Circle–Families Forum joins more than 800 bereaved Israeli and Palestinian families working for reconciliation.
Vivian Silver · Parents Circle–Families Forum
Torah · Deuteronomy 20:10
The next verse sets hard terms, but the first move is an offer. Maimonides applied it to almost every war (Kings and Wars 6:1).
Maimonides · Laws of Kings and Wars 6:7 · translation by Eliyahu Touger
A city under siege must never be surrounded on all four sides.
Proverbs · Proverbs 24:17
The rabbis · Avot de-Rabbi Natan 23
Israel's founding · Declaration of Independence · 14 May 1948
It also promises equal rights to all inhabitants, irrespective of religion, race or sex.
Israel's army · The Spirit of the IDF · purity of arms
Yitzhak Rabin · White House · 13 September 1993
Said to the Palestinians. In 1995 he was shot dead by a Jewish extremist who claimed a religious rule, din rodef, justified it.
Prime Minister Netanyahu, 28 October 2023: You must remember what Amalek has done to you, says our Holy Bible. And we do remember.
South Africa told the world court this pointed to an order to destroy Amalek; Israel said Amalek meant Hamas.
World court case file · JTA · The Forward · The New Arab
Moshe Feiglin, elected to the Knesset on 27 October 2026: It's not a question of how you see us, it's a question of how we see you. And it says in the book, in the Bible, “Those who bless you will be blessed, and those who curse you will be cursed.”
In May 2025 he said every child, every baby in Gaza is an enemy
.
Jerusalem Post · Middle East Eye
Jerusalem Day, May 2026. A settler teenager from Texas, asked by ABC News what should happen to Palestinians in the Old City:
“Leave or we'll kill you.”
On Muslims: I think Islam is cancer, and you don't transfer cancer to another patient. That's not moral. Destroy cancer.
Asked what destroy looks like: Either kill or re-educate all Muslims.
Nobody is born thinking this. It is taught, and adults teach it. Neither of these two speaks for all Israelis, just as Hamas does not speak for all Palestinians.
ABC News, 15 May 2026 · Middle East Eye · Instagram
Hamas says the Al-Qassam Brigades' fighters didn't target civilians
. That is false: at least 800 of the roughly 1,200 dead were civilians, and a UN Commission of Inquiry found deliberate killing, hostage-taking and sexual violence. The same commission found Israel committed war crimes in Gaza. A cause can be just and a method can still be a crime.
Hamas, Our Narrative · UN News, June 2024
Quran · Quran 5:8 · translation by Mustafa Khattab
Quran · Quran 8:61 · translation by Mustafa Khattab
The first caliph · Abu Bakr · Muwatta Malik 21.10
Killing families at home and young people at a music festival on 7 October fails this test. So does killing children anywhere, whoever does it.
In 2022 Putin invaded Ukraine to denazify
it, though its president is Jewish, and a church council headed by Patriarch Kirill called it a Holy War
. The Gospel says: Love your enemies.
The International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant. A UN Commission of Inquiry concluded in September 2025 that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza; Israel rejects this, and the world court has not yet ruled. 157 of 193 United Nations members now recognise Palestine. Criticising a government's war is not hatred of Jews.
United Nations · Recognition of Palestine · JusticeInfo
See the record, case by case: The War Crimes Safari: Gaza and the West Bank, 2023 to 2026.
Common sense
Defence minister Yoav Gallant: We are imposing a complete siege on the city of Gaza. There will be no electricity, no food, no water, no fuel… We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly.
This is the translation in the footage; others say the Gaza Strip
.
Euronews No Comment on YouTube
Collective punishment is a war crime: No protected person may be punished for an offence he or she has not personally committed
(Fourth Geneva Convention, Article 33). The International Criminal Court says Gallant is allegedly responsible for starvation as a method of warfare. There has been no trial, and Israel rejects the court's jurisdiction.
Geneva Convention IV · International Criminal Court
When a state rejects the court, the evidence still deserves a hearing. That is the job of the Independent Tribunal, part of the Planetary Council: every claim labelled by how strong it is (asserted, signed, supported, checked or found), all sides heard, solutions proposed.
What everyone wants
A safe home, a loving family, good food, good work, good friends, good vibes. In London, New York and Dubai, people of every faith already live side by side.
Same water, same food, same sleep, same dreams. People are people.
Don't take this page's word for it
Every quote links to its source. The page was fact-checked over many rounds by ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Grok, Perplexity, DeepSeek, Mistral, Kimi and Qwen. AI checks help, but they are not proof. Found a mistake? Say so at planetarycouncil.org; feedback from Israeli readers is especially welcome.