The above headline might seem preposterous to many of you, but it is an argument repeated ad nauseum by Israel's sympathisers, despite the obvious facts that Israel is neither fighting for its existence, nor facing an Arab world that refuses to make peace with it.

The first part of this argument, that Israel is fighting for its survival, has been used since Israel's establishment in 1948, despite the fact that it was always militarily more powerful than the Arab states. Its expansions, attacks, invasions and occupations of Arab land since its establishment are testament to this.

However, the argument is even weaker in the present day, given that Israel is at peace with its neighbours Jordan and Egypt (historically the strongest Arab military opponent of Israel), and it is not actively engaged in combat with any other Arab country (its neighbour Syria is widely acknowledged on both sides as being unable to challenge Israel militarily).

Currently, it is only fighting Palestinian militants and those of Hezbollah. In effect, the region's only nuclear power, with one of the most sophisticated armies in the world consisting of hundreds of thousands of trained soldiers, backed militarily, economically and politically by the world's only superpower to the tune of billions of dollars a year, is fighting against a few thousand militants armed with rudimentary weapons.

Palestine has no army (or state) and is cut off from the outside world by Israel. The Lebanese army, which is not even fighting Israel, is more symbolic than anything else. Hezbollah's arsenal consists mainly of rockets dating back to the 1970s. If one looks objectively at the level of destruction currently inflicted by Israel on Palestine and Lebanon, and vice versa, it is plain to see that it is the latter two fighting for their very survival.