I also wanted to ask about this, from another angle: don’t these commandments teach us about the holiness of the Land of Israel and its importance to the Jewish people and to the Holy One, blessed be He? (In addition, of course, to the fact that it is the promised land.) Isn’t it worth fighting for such an important land?

I’m not sure they teach anything of the sort. A large number of commandments could also reflect that there are many matters there that require attention. True, the Mishnah in Keilim says that this does reflect the holiness of the Land of Israel, but there are also many laws concerning consecrated offerings and ritual purity, and I do not devote my life to restoring them. One certainly can and should fight, but that is not the essential aspect of my identity. If the Jewish people had settled in Uganda, I would have preferred to be there, just like all our ancestors throughout the generations and like the Jews in the diaspora today. I do not see the Land of Israel as something of supreme importance.
According to your logic, I ought to be a farmer, since most of the commandments dependent on the Land are not relevant to me at all even when I live in the Land.

Rabbi, but from the Torah it is definitely understood that this is the direction of the Jewish people—that there is an idea that we should inherit this land. In the Talmud they mention the connection between the Land of Israel and redemption, with statements such as “there is no clearer revealed end than this,” when the fruits of the Land of Israel come forth.
And certainly, everyone agrees that our ancestors lived outside the Land, but how can one not ask the simple question: why did they live there? If they had been asked where they wanted the Jewish state to be established, what would they have said? I think you are mistaken in your judgment here. True, settling the Land is only one commandment among all the commandments, and true, if the state had been established in Uganda then we would have gone there—but to get up and say that this is not a component of our identity is another matter. The identity of a people is its land; it has value just as the name Israel has value, even though it is only a name and one could replace it and still remain a people that keeps Torah and commandments and descends from our father Abraham.

In all your emotion, you forgot what I said—or just didn’t bother listening.

Michi, if there is no obligation to place ourselves under an obligation to commandments, and therefore no obligation to live in the Land, then why do you wear tzitzit? After all, there is no obligation to wear a four-cornered garment.

Obviously there is no obligation to put on tzitzit if you do not have a four-cornered garment. That is done in order to gain an additional commandment, and there is such a custom.

It may be that being a farmer is a higher level of connection to the Land of Israel.