A World Without Israel (I don't usually say MUST-READ, but in this case I do)

Foreign Policy ^ | January/February 2005 | Josef Joffe

[quidnunc]

Imagine that Israel never existed. Would the economic malaise and political repression that drive angry young men to become suicide bombers vanish? Would the Palestinians have an independent state? Would the United States, freed of its burdensome ally, suddenly find itself beloved throughout the Muslim world? Wishful thinking. Far from creating tensions, Israel actually contains more antagonisms than it causes.

Since World War II, no state has suffered so cruel a reversal of fortunes as Israel. Admired all the way into the 1970s as the state of “those plucky Jews” who survived against all odds and made democracy and the desert bloom in a climate hostile to both liberty and greenery, Israel has become the target of creeping delegitimization. The denigration comes in two guises. The first, the soft version, blames Israel first and most for whatever ails the Middle East, and for having corrupted U.S. foreign policy. It is the standard fare of editorials around the world, not to mention the sheer venom oozing from the pages of the Arab-Islamic press. The more recent hard version zeroes in on Israel’s very existence. According to this dispensation, it is Israel as such, and not its behavior, that lies at the root of troubles in the Middle East. Hence the “statocidal” conclusion that Israel’s birth, midwifed by both the United States and the Soviet Union in 1948, was a grievous mistake, grandiose and worthy as it may have been at the time.

-snip-

[paltz]

ping

[quidnunc]

For your consideration

[claudiustg]

The Arabs ought to pray 5 times daily for Israel's well being, because if anything should happen to Israel the Arabs will all learn the darker meaning of "never again".

[superskunk]

How dare those Jews defend themselves against homicidal Islamofascists who want to kill them!

Good read! Thanks for posting it. (What's really cool is "Islamofascists" passed the spell checker.)

[American in Israel]

What would happen if Israel ceased to exist? Well according to the Bible, all Mankind would be doomed to hell, because salvation comes through the Jews. The Bible would be disproved, Satan will have won.

That is why so much effort is spent to destroy the Jews, it is just Satan trying to escape the inevitable and to destroy mankind in the process, a "win win" situation for him.

But, he fails, I have read the back of the book...

[superskunk]

But, he fails, I have read the back of the book...

Gee...thanks for ruining the ending for us. :)

[WestVirginiaRebel]

My question is: What if Israel had been created after WW 1 as was originally intended? What role would they have played against the Nazis and their Arab allies in WW 2?

[dennisw]

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=2737&print=1&PHPSESSID=f6feb49135e0e74af7a20a9a32a56763

[my_pointy_head_is_sharp]

For a moment, I thought the name Josef Joffe looked familiar. I discovered a site the other day called factsandlogic.org. But the man on that site is Gerardo Joffe. Wonder if there's a connection.

[claptrap]

Zacheriah Chapter 13, God speaking through Zech says,
"I will make Jerusalem a heavy stone, and all who try
to lift it will be cut to pieces" funny how a document written so long ago can have such relevance in current
events, just think Jerusalem wasnt even a capitol of anything less than Sixty years ago!

[American in Israel]

Will all of this right itself when that Judeo-Western insult to Arab pride finally vanishes? Will the millions of unemployed and bored young men, cannon fodder for the terrorists, vanish as well—along with one-party rule, corruption, and closed economies? This notion makes sense only if one cherishes single-cause explanations or, worse, harbors a particular animus against the Jewish state and its refusal to behave like Sweden. (Come to think of it, Sweden would not be Sweden either if it lived in the Hobbesian world of the Middle East.)

Finally, the most popular what-if issue of them all: Would the Islamic world hate the United States less if Israel vanished? Like all what-if queries, this one, too, admits only suggestive evidence. To begin, the notion that 5 million Jews are solely responsible for the rage of 1 billion or so Muslims cannot carry the weight assigned to it. Second, Arab-Islamic hatreds of the United States preceded the conquest of the West Bank and Gaza. Recall the loathing left behind by the U.S.-managed coup that restored the shah’s rule in Tehran in 1953, or the U.S. intervention in Lebanon in 1958. As soon as Britain and France left the Middle East, the United States became the dominant power and the No. 1 target. Another bit of suggestive evidence is that the fiercest (unofficial) anti-Americanism emanates from Washington’s self-styled allies in the Arab Middle East, Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Is this situation because of Israel—or because it is so convenient for these regimes to “busy giddy minds with foreign quarrels” (as Shakespeare’s Henry IV put it) to distract their populations from their dependence on the “Great Satan”?

Take the Cairo Declaration against “U.S. hegemony,” endorsed by 400 delegates from across the Middle East and the West in December 2002. The lengthy indictment mentions Palestine only peripherally. The central condemnation, uttered in profuse variation, targets the United States for monopolizing power “within the framework of capitalist globalization,” for reinstating “colonialism,” and for blocking the “emergence of forces that would shift the balance of power toward multi-polarity.” In short, Global America is responsible for all the afflictions of the Arab world, with Israel coming in a distant second...

Is this anti-Semitism, as so many Jews are quick to suspect? No, but denying Israel’s legitimacy bears an uncanny resemblance to some central features of this darkest of creeds. Accordingly, the Jews are omnipotent, ubiquitous, and thus responsible for the evils of the world. Today, Israel finds itself in an analogous position, either as handmaiden or manipulator of U.S. might. The soft version sighs: “If only Israel were more reasonable…” The semihard version demands that “the United States pull the rug out from under Israel” to impose the pliancy that comes from impotence. And the hard-hard version dreams about salvation springing from Israel’s disappearance.

Why, sure—if it weren’t for that old joke from Israel’s War of Independence: While the bullets were whistling overhead and the two Jews in their foxhole were running out of rounds, one griped, “If the Brits had to give us a country not their own, why couldn’t they have given us Switzerland?” Alas, Israel is just a strip of land in the world’s most noxious neighborhood, and the cleanup hasn’t even begun.

Long read but very good!

[neverdem]

From time to time, I’ll post or ping on noteworthy articles about politics, foreign and military affairs. FReepmail me if you want on or off my list.

This is a long, but excellent analysis.

[loboinok]

Well according to the Bible, all Mankind would be doomed to hell, because salvation comes through the Jews.


So where does Jesus Christ fit into this salvation?

[mhx]

So where does Jesus Christ fit into this salvation? Yes. My salvation comes from Jesus, who was a Jew.

[esoxmagnum]

Jesus was a Jew, was he not?

Not to offend anyone here, but when Jesus preached, like it or not, he preached the Torah, he wasn't walking around with the New Testament or the King James Bible in his hands.

One of the perplexing mysteries of Religion I have, is, if Jesus taught the Old Testament, and was a Jew, wouldn't we be best serving Jesus by following the book that he taught?

I know many many Christians who want nothing to do with the Old Testament Case in point, we have a big church here in the Chicago suburbs, that won't even touch on the Old Testament. Its one of those multi-denomanational Christian churches with 50,000 members that my brothers family attends regularly.

Then again, I'm told that they don't use the word Sin in that church, because it may offend some people....

Go figure

Not sure what my point is here, I just think that churches in this area (extreme liberal Chicago) are more concerned with their acoustical guitars than they are with the Old Testament.

Not sure if this is for marketing purposes, or do some people really think that Jesus was not a Jew, therefore did he not teach the Old Testament?

Seems to be a glaring oversight on most religious discussions.

[lainde]

BTTT

[raygun]

That church doesn't use the word "sin" because it might offend people? I guess they don't preach the cross either. The cross is the most offensive thing known to man.

Moreover, according to II Tim 3:16,17 all Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction, in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.

How can one understand the context of John 3:14, without consulting Num 21 (especially v9). What about Isa 53? Who is the prophet refering to: himself, or somebody yet to come? What about the prophecy in Isa 7:14, or Malachi concerning the birthplace of the Lord? What about the other 329 prophecies regarding that? They're all contained in the Old Testament. What is the writer to the Hebrews talking about concerning Malchezedic? Who is Malchezedic? One has to look in the Old Testament to find that out.

I've seen a whole sermon preached on the first 3 verses in Psalms 1. What about the admonition in Isa 1:18? People say that the mind of God can not be known. Poppycock, Dt 29:29 tells us otherwise. We can know the mind of God according to what he revealed to us, and some of His revelation is contained in the Old Testament. All of the Old Testament is focused on the coming of Christ foretold, while the New Testament is Christ's coming fullfilled.

[Seeing More Clearly Now]

"Jesus was a Jew, was he not?"

Yes, Mary and Joseph, had a kosher kitchen.

[PGalt]

Good article. Thanks for the recommendation.