The entire bible is a story of the Jewish people losing their land due to moral failings. Repeatedly. From Judges through 2 Kings, Israel repeatedly loses divine protection precisely because of its own wickedness. Being “chosen” meant bearing covenantal responsibility, not enjoying a blank moral check.
Deuteronomy 20:15-18 is more appropriate to the current conflict, as it relates to how the Jews should fight wars in the land of Israel. It commands the utter destruction of the inhabitants of the land, not sparing any that breathe (not just those who “pisseth-on-the-wall”)
Discussions about modern Israel/Palestine are full of shibboleths that reveal where people are drawing their information:
In the Hebrew the word in 20:16 for inheritance is “Nachala”. Worth Googling: Nachala is also the name of a present‑day Israeli settler movement led by Daniella Weiss, whose own literature says it’s “continuing the biblical mandate to settle the land.”
In other words, the same term that the Torah uses for a gift that can be forfeited is now used as branding for a modern political project—illustrating how ancient vocabulary still shapes today’s arguments about the land.
For an example from the Palestinian side: you do not have a full understanding of Hamas if you do not know about the Hadith about the Gharqad tree. Hamas charter writers alluded to this story; many Palestinians learn it young, while most Israelis have never heard of it.
Recognizing these code‑words doesn’t require agreeing with the theology behind them. It simply keeps us from talking past each other—and, one hopes, from letting someone else’s apocalyptic script dictate who lives and dies. I think we all agree that the other-sides’ eschatology is a dumb reason to die.