How to code the dining Philosophers in Java using semaphores?

I have to code a solution to the dining philosophers problem in Java using semaphores. The semaphore is done "by hand" creating a semaphore class. And looks like this:

package principal;
public class Semaforo {
private int valor;
private int esperando;
public Semaforo(int valor) {
    this.valor=valor;
    this.esperando=0;
}
public synchronized void down() {
    if (this.valor >0 ){
        this.valor--;
    } else {
        this.esperando++;
        try {
            wait();
        } catch (Exception e) {

        }
    }
}
public int getValor() {
    return valor;
}
public synchronized void up() {
    if (this.valor > 0) {
        this.valor++;
    } else {
        if (this.esperando >0 ) {
            notify();
            this.esperando--;
        } else {
            this.valor++;
        }
    }
}
}

I would be nice if I had a solution that avoids problems of concurrency like deadlocks, starvation, live-locks, and so on. I thought of having each philosopher eat at his own time, but I don't know how I could accomplish that with semaphores. How do I solve the dinning philosophers problem with semaphores in Java?

Any help is appreciated.

This (page 87) goes over the Dining Philosophers problem taken from Tanenbaum's Modern Operating Systems 3e. The problem is solved with sempahores in the C programming language.