"Even if you are at war with a city… you must not destroy its trees." (Deut 20: 19-20)

This citation from the 'Jews for Peace in Palestine and Israel' website makes me grin. That's a perfect example for selective citation. The context is this:

Deut 20: 13-18
20:13 And when the LORD thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword:
20:14 But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the LORD thy God hath given thee.
20:15 Thus shalt thou do unto all the cities which are very far off from thee, which are not of the cities of these nations.
20:16 But of the cities of these people, which the LORD thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth:
20:17 But thou shalt utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee:
20:18 That they teach you not to do after all their abominations, which they have done unto their gods; so should ye sin against the LORD your God.

And then comes the advice not to cut down the trees that may be useful for the attacker by supplying food but only the others for the bulwarks.

If this citation is any indication for their care I wouldn't trust their numbers too much.

I'd love to find in this conflict a website as useful and unbiased as CAIN is for the Northern Ireland conflict. The above website is not even internally consistent.

Wolfgang