Java Build Tools: Ant vs. Maven

Take a look at http://buildr.apache.org. It is built on top of Rake and adds multi-module support, Java support (compile, package), remote dependencies (following maven repositories, but can be customized) and ability to use Ant tasks.

I used to think this is the winning approach. However, experience at a client shows this may not be the case:
1. the DSL is still ruby. As the build does more and more complex stuff, the ruby syntax leaks through. A developer writing a module and wishing to add it to the build doesn't want to learn ruby to do this.
2. Rake (and therefore Buildr) offer more fine-grained and file-based tasks. Somehow (I don't know why), this doesn't "compile" well with many.
3. No IDE plugins available to manage buildr/rake build file. E.g., in Eclipse using maven I import my projects and immediately get the dependencies resolved, sources attached.

I would consider the winning approach to be either:
1. a tool where the build logic is in Java. Sure, it will be very verbose and not DSLish, but it is what the developers know.
2. a layer over tools like rake/buildr/gradle/gant where common definitions of modules, dependencies etc. is done in a declarative way (e.g., yaml)

An ant and an elephant are playing hide-and-seek near a place which has 1000 temples. The elephant starts counting. The ant goes into one of the temples and hides. The elephant finishes counting, and within a few seconds knows which temple the ant entered. How does he know which one?
The ant left his slippers outside the temple.