Clark writes:

"the attack on Israel was really massive wasn't it- all of 44 civilians killed and some structural damage in Haifa and Tyre."

Leaving aside the very good reasons why there were "only" a relatively small number of Israeli casualties, I would have thought that for a man who is married to a gentile citizen of an evil nation which openly collaborated in the murder of well over 500,000 Jews, the death of one innocent Jew would have been one Jew too many.

Some structural damage? The man is either a knave or a fool and quite possibly a combination of both.

Clark writes:

"And of course, it was entirely unprovoked."

Yes, actually it was entirely unprovoked.

The bottom line is that Hezbollah was attempting to kill as many Israelis as possible. That organisation was not deterred in the least by Israel's possession of nuclear weapons. If it could have levelled every Israeli city it would have done so. The actual number of Israelis killed or the damage inflicted is irrelevant here. Clarke's claim that "it does mean that no other country is going to launch a full scale military invasion or rein bombs down on your cities" is patently false.

Clark writes:

"If Stephen really does believe that nuclear weapons don't make a state secure, then why does he support Israel having them?"

Because in certain circumstances the possession of those weapons does protect a nation like Israel from destruction. This does not of course mean that she will be protected in all circumstances either from destruction or vicious attack.

I should also draw your attention to the so-called Yom Kippur War when the Arab nations nearly succeeded in destroying Israel and also the First Persian Gulf War when Saddam fired off 39 scud missiles at Israel.

Did he really teach at Oxford? On the other hand, I'm not surprised he's tossed the occasional bone by the Guardian.

Hezbollah is not 'another country' though. Anyway, I thought Israel didn't have nuclear weapons.....

Clarkie writes again:

"With respect, Kenny, I don't think Israel is a good example. Their nculear programme has always been shrouded in mystery and the key point is that whatever capabiltiy they might have had in 1973 (most agree that it had no nuclear capability in 1967)-its opponents did not know of its nuclear programme- therefore it had no deterrent effect."

He simply makes it up as he goes along.

Even when the Israelis had informed Kissinger at the height of the 1973 war that they were about to use nuclear weapons and K had passed on this information to the other side, the attacks on Israel continued. Israel had been producing around 5 bombs a year since 1968. Every intelligence agency on the planet was aware of this. Indeed, by 1967 Nasser was utterly convinced that Israel would have the bomb by the following year (by 1968 Israel actually had two nuclear weapons).

Incidentally, the U.S. had basically abandoned Israel in 1973. It was only because of Israel's threat to use nuclear weapons that Kissinger and Nixon agreed to resupply the Israelis. However, before any weapons reached the Israeli forces, the Israelis had counter-attacked and turned the tide on two fronts.

It should also be noted that every single European nation refused America permission to overfly its territory if it was carrying arms to Israel. Incredibly this included Germany barely 28 years after the end of the Holocaust.

What this of course proves is that when push comes to shove Israel stands alone - no gentile nation in the world can be trusted to safeguard Jewish interests - nothing has really changed since World War II. This is the very reason why every decent Jew should be willing to lay down his life to protect the Jewish state. It is also the reason why Israel's possession of nuclear weapons is so very important.

Clark is not alone. BBC's John Simpson in setting the scene for his recent interview with the boy Assad, stated that Hizballah's rockets had "tormented" Israel.

"when push comes to shove Israel stands alone"

If only. We wouldn't have so many dead British nationals if we weren't fighting proxy wars on behalf of the Jewish state.