Bullying

Posted on November 12, 2010 | 4 comments

     Bullying has been part of the recent news cycle, before being drowned out by the elections, because of the tragic suicides of several children (and one Rutgers student) driven to despair by the relentless harassment they allegedly endured from schoolmates. Some were taunted for promiscuity, others for homosexuality (the Rutgers student was publicly outed), all of which naturally led to a campaign to denounce bullying, bullying against homosexuals, or laws to prohibit bullying or cyber-bullying.

     It will surprise no one that bullying has been a fixture of the schoolyard since time immemorial, and usually was handled quite adroitly by the victim, his/her friends, or peers of the bully. Children who are different are teased for those differences; it is one way that the young learn (sometimes slowly) to relate to and respect those who are different from them. It affects the tall/short, fat/thin, smart/less so, athletic/not at all – and whites and blacks, Jews and non-Jews, citizens and foreigners, and these days, children who are perceived (rightfully or not) as having homosexual tendencies. While the number of suicides is quite small, every death is of course a tragedy. The numbers, though, do provide perspective: A  much-trumpeted 2007study reported that 17% of “homosexual” teens consider suicide, and 5% actually attempt it. That is a devastating statistic, until one considers that the Center for Disease Control reports that (http://www.teensuicidestatistics.com/statistics-facts.html ) that 60 percent of high school students claim that they have thought about committing suicide, and approximately 9% of them say that they have tried killing themselves at least once. Obviously, the problem is greater than the mere bullying of one sub-group, as the statistics reveal that fewer homosexual youth consider suicide than heterosexual youth. Apparently, then, the crisis is deeper than we think, and for reasons other than we assume.

      That is not to minimize the anguish felt by young people who sense they have homosexual tendencies. What is often perceived as a crisis depends more on perception than on reality (e.g., an average of two dozen IDF soldiers commit suicide every year, but that sad fact is not advertised as a crisis and the IDF deals with it in a discreet manner), and this particular crisis has gained its notoriety owing in large part to the zeitgeist that sees legitimization of homosexuality as a societal imperative.

      Thus the response of the liberal elites, as always, has assumed the usual forms of regulating feelings and promulgating laws. For example, I was badgered by a reporter several weeks ago because I refused to pass the latest litmus test for sensitivity: would I denounce violence and bullying against homosexuals? I stated repeatedly that I would enthusiastically denounce violence and bullying against any person or group – the whole list mentioned above, and including homosexuals – but I would not single out one group for special treatment. No person – of whatever religion, race, sex, orientation, sports team affiliation – should be bullied, harassed, tormented, etc. by anyone for any reason with legal and moral justification. That was not enough for the intrepid reporter, who likely deemed me hopelessly insensitive.

   For the same reason, I oppose “hate crimes” legislation. I do not believe that my life is any less meaningful because I do not belong to one of the protected or favored classes in society. People who murder others and are convicted should be executed regardless of who they killed or why they killed them. In law, motive is almost irrelevant; actions matter. Motive is important in the media and movies because they help tell a story, but the story has little probative value in the courtroom. Motive need not be proven, and is rarely an element of the crime. But liberal society has two obsessions: one is defining people by the group to which they belong, and bestowing special rights on members of that group.

    In such an environment, the only eligible victims of hate crimes are blacks, sometimes Hispanics or Asians, women, homosexuals and Muslims. Whites, Christians, Jews, men, or heterosexuals need not apply. Rabbi Meir Kahane could be shot or Yankel Rosenbaum stabbed to death without the assailants charged with a hate crime. The Fort Hood shooter, a Muslim named Maj. Nidal Hasan, could kill 12 people (white American Christians, and soldiers at that) and not be accused of a hate crime, only because the victims were not members of the special class. That is bizarre, and inexplicable how the very notion does not violate the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. Its very premise is un-American: every person is the same before the law. In this, hate crimes legislation follows neatly the thesis of the affirmative action laws.

    The second liberal obsession is also on display here – the recourse to law to effect social change. Laws in many states now criminalize bullying and cyber-bullying, especially in school. Bullies can be subject to suspension (which is fine with me) but also prosecution, which is strange. The problem in the public schools is not an absence of laws but an absence of values, and public schools for the last half-century have been constrained in their ability to impart values by the rigid removal of “G-d” from public education. Without G-d, the notion of objective morality is lost, and “laws” become a poor and ineffective replacement. There was something to be said for posting the “Ten Commandments” in the classrooms of America – it was a constant reminder that we were a “nation under G-d” and had subtle influence on classroom discussion and behavior.

     Consider: to label something “illegal” raises several questions in the mind of the potential miscreant – is it illegal ? If it is illegal, will I get caught ? If I get caught, will I be prosecuted ? If I am prosecuted, will I be convicted ? If I am convicted, will I go to prison ? At any point along the line, the miscreant can conclude that the satisfaction of performance of the illicit act exceeds the potentially adverse consequences of apprehension.

      By contrast, to characterize something as “immoral” raises only one question for that same miscreant: is the prospective deed right or wrong ? If it is “wrong,” or “immoral,” no other questions need be asked. To the extent that schools – society – educates its citizens on what is legal or illegal and not what is moral or immoral, it will always be fighting an uphill and likely unwinnable battle against all sorts of social ills, including bullying.

     A society that trains its young to perceive all others as “creatures of G-d” finds it easier to exercise control over the rambunctious excesses of youth, and, more importantly, when they invariably stumble –as all children do – has a handy reference point with which to delineate acceptable and unacceptable modes of behavior: “The Torah says….” or “Hashem says…” Bullying was as common in yeshiva schoolyards in my days as it is today, but no one thought of bringing in the secular authorities. There really is a Higher Authority whose reach is more pervasive, and Torah education focuses on making G-d’s will and morality a vibrant part of the life of the student. I have often witnessed young children crying in a supermarket (understatement, that) for a particular candy that the beleaguered mother refuses to buy, with the children howling until the (Jewish) mother says, ‘But it is not kosher.’ With that, he howling immediately stops, as the finality of G-d’s moral system impresses even the young. But the parent who is forced to rely on considerations of dinner or appetite, or even health (“the government is cracking down on obesity”, is on shakier ground, ground made even shakier by the persistent shrieks of their tots.

     We should treat all men and women with decency and sensitivity, and inculcate that value in our young – and for the best, and ultimately the only meaningful, reason: that all humans were created in the image of G-d. When that simple notion takes root in society, we will be much closer to the day of mutual respect and brotherhood than we are today, with all our sophisticated laws and regulations.

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Posted in Contemporary Life, Current Events, Machshava/Jewish Thought

Constitutional Contortions

Posted on November 7, 2010 | 4 comments

      The United States Constitution is the one of the world’s oldest frameworks for national governance that is still extant, and has successfully guided American democracy through wars, depressions, turmoil, upheavals, and multiple elections in which power changed hands willingly, if not gracefully. It is astonishing to consider that the drafting of the Constitution took almost a year to compose, almost two years to win ratification, and yet has been subjected to consistent and usually contentious amendment in the 220 years plus since its original appearance. The Constitutional Convention weighed different and competing interests, resolving some issues forever and leaving others to future generations to refine. In some cases (the framework for the three branches of government) it remains mostly unchanged, whereas in others, the simple intent of the Framers has become almost unrecognizable and far afield from a clear and logical reading of the text.

      A case in point is the relationship between government and religion that is one subject of the First Amendment to the Constitution, approved by the States as part of the “Bill of Rights” in the early 1790’s. In pertinent part, it reads: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…” Both the words and the intent seem unequivocally clear: Congress shall have no right to declare an official state religion, in obvious contradistinction to Britain where the Anglican Church is the official state church and the monarch the titular head of that church. The United States was to have no official state religion, a practice that has been scrupulously followed in the more than two centuries since.

      It never dawned on the Framers that prayer in public schools or the provision of tacit assistance to parochial schools could be “unconstitutional,” because neither involved the “establishment of religion” by Congress. Nor did the Framers ever intend that the federal government for constitutional reasons had to consistently demonstrate hostility or aversion to religion. Chaplains in Congress and the military, paid for by the federal government, and opening sessions with prayers, were the norms then and now.

    Hence the puzzle of the Supreme Court’s First Amendment jurisprudence that has stretched the “free exercise” clause beyond all reasonable definition and greatly encumbered the practice of religion in America. For example, the Supremes last week heard argument in the case of Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization v. Winn. The facts are simple: in 1997, the state of Arizona passed a law that allows residents to contribute $500 ($1000 for a married couple) to a non-profit school tuition organization that they would otherwise pay in taxes. The choice of organization is solely and exclusively that of the parents, and can go to private or parochial school; government is uninvolved in the decision, except to the extent that the tax credit afforded the parents is money that otherwise would have gone to the government. It seems constitutionally innocuous, and a sensible, if modest, way to reimburse families who prefer a religious-based, private education for their children for their otherwise unrecompensed contributions to the public school education of their neighbors’ children. Orthodox Jews, for example, have long been victims of this double-taxation – paying for both the public education of others and the private education of our own children (who, in fact, would greatly encumber the public school system if educated there). In effect, the public school system gets a free ride on the backs of private or parochial school parents, and traditionally the private school parents have little recourse but to fume, skimp, grin and bear these additional costs. The Arizona law was a small attempt to redress this imbalance, which offended Winn, clearly some local busybody and troublemaker.

     Yet, the super-liberal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, based in San Francisco, struck down this law as unconstitutional on the grounds that it violates the “establishment of religion” clause, leading to its current hearing before the Supreme Court. But how precisely does affording individual parents the right to divert some of their state tax dollars to their own children’s education amount to a violation of a mandate that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion…” ? How is Congress involved, and how does this law establish a religion ? It allows people of all religions or no religion to effectively minimize the costs of their children’s private school education.

        To its continuing shame, the Anti-Defamation League (and the American Jewish Committee, among other useless and superfluous organizations) filed “Friend of the Court” briefs in support of the respondent Winn, arguing against the Arizona law. This approach is in keeping with the grand traditions of those Jewish organizations in protecting the Jews from the Christian “menace” by waging war against Torah education in America, a war that has been remarkably successful in greasing the skids of assimilation and intermarriage in this country. To its credit, Agudath Israel and the Orthodox Union filed briefs in support of the Petitioners, and in support of the Arizona law, which they asserted follows prior Supreme Court precedent (Zelman v. Simmons-Harris, 2002). In a 5-4 vote, the Court there upheld a Cleveland school voucher program where the choice of schools was, again, parent-driven and not determined by the government. But why would even four Supremes vote then that the voucher program is unconstitutional ?

    The first breach in diluting the simple meaning of the Constitution came in a letter written by President Thomas Jefferson in 1802 to the Danbury Baptists Association which feared state government encroachment on their religious practices. Jefferson argued there that the First Amendment built “a wall of separation between Church and State.” The phrase, of course, never appears in the Constitution, and it is clear that Jefferson meant that the State has no right to interfere, obstruct, impede or otherwise hinder the practice of religion. But Jefferson certainly never intended that the “wall of separation” prohibited government from extending benefits to all religions or required government to penalize the practice of religion. Yet, that is how anti-religion groups like “Americans United for Separation of Church and State,” joined by their fellow travelers in the ADL, et al, insist that the Constitution must be interpreted, and that is how the Supreme Court began interpreting it in the 1950s.

     In the 19th century, the provisions of the First Amendment and much of the Bill of Rights was made applicable to the states, and when the secular-progressive agenda began to dominate American culture and the media elite in the late 1950s and early 1960s, the Supremes took due notice – questioning (though eventually permitting) the funding of the transportation of parochial school students; banning prayer in public schools – even being troubled by a moment of silence; declaring that the state cannot defray the salaries of secular teachers in parochial schools (bizarre, because the government would have had to pay to build schools, hire teachers, etc., to accommodate these students if there weren’t any parochial schools); permitting the provision of textbooks and milk (sometimes the Supreme Court’s logic is exceedingly arcane, if indecipherable – and sometimes, it just depends on who is sitting on the Court at any particular time); prohibiting religious prayers at graduations, and dancing through hoops wrestling with religious displays on public grounds during holiday seasons, alternatively permitting and prohibiting them depending on obscure factors and dubious reasoning. (The Menora is not a religious symbol? Huh?) Personally, I have always found Jewish objections to Christian religious displays around holiday season to be a function of small-mindedness coupled with intolerance; America is, after all, almost 85% Christian.

       To further complicate matters, then-Senator Lyndon Johnson pushed through an amendment to a bill in 1954 that prohibited non-profits and religious organizations from endorsing or opposing political candidates, a gross violation of another clause in the First Amendment that prohibits Congress from making any law “abridging the freedom of speech.” Johnson justified this restriction on grounds of the “wall of separation,” again completely distorting Jefferson’s meaning of the phrase. (Johnson had been under terrific pressure from some Christian groups, so he just silenced them.)

       But, most recently, the issue of school vouchers and tax credits for private and parochial school families has heralded the Court’s reversion to a more text-based and reasonable interpretation of the “establishment” and “free exercise” clauses. It is therefore astonishing that the secular Jewish groups are trapped in a reading of the Constitution that was popular with the Court from the 1950s-1980s, and is more guided by liberal dogma than original intent or, especially, recognitions of the general value of religion in public school and the specific Jewish interest in easing the financial burdens on doubly-taxed Jewish families. Shame on them. They seem to be petrified of the role of Christianity in American life and the threat allegedly posed therefore to the survival of Judaism. Evidently, they fear that Crusaders are lurking around every street corner (hence their perception that Christian evangelicals pose a great danger to Jewish life than radical Muslims), and do not recognize that the greatest hazard is not missionizing Christians but Jews who are ignorant of our heritage. In so many ways, and especially in this instance, these organizations are ossified, incarcerated in the past, and irrelevant to modern Jewish life.

      The Supremes are always hard to read, and their decisions these days on controversial cases usually rest on one vote – that of swing Justice Anthony Kennedy. And these matters always trigger discussions of the correct mode of Constitutional interpretation – between those who favor “original intent” (ascertaining what the Framers meant, because otherwise the Constitution becomes ultimately meaningless and can be twisted by every generation or Justice) and those who see the Constitution as a “living document” that can be updated by every generation. According to the latter, capital punishment can be “unconstitutional” even though the Framers of the Constitution referred to it and accepted it, and new provisions – like the “right to privacy” – can be located within the penumbra of the document, or hovering in the thin air just above it. (It is fascinating that the Torah is loosely subject to the same dispute as to interpretation – between traditional Torah Jews who are bound to the original intent and try to ascertain the Torah’s meaning based on precedent and application, and the non-Orthodox Jews who shape the Torah as a ball of wax according to their current assessment of prevailing moral notions and the public good.)

     In any event, we should hope that the Supreme Court reverses the Ninth Circuit (as they often do), upholds the Arizona law, and strengthens and protects the practice of religion in America so the United States returns to the traditional religious moorings that are the foundation of this Republic.

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Divided Government

Posted on November 4, 2010 | 1 comment

       The simplest understanding of “divided government” is that is a formula for policy paralysis. The election results (in which it can be said that the Democrats O-bombed) that gave Republicans control of the House of Representatives and left the Democrats a majority of the Senate means that no major initiatives will pass, the White House will become increasingly frustrated (and vindictive), and the national mood will darken.

       But the simple understanding is not necessarily accurate. Divided government might be the most efficient and popular configuration as it retains and emphasizes the checks and balances that are the heart of the American government. Bret Stephens (Wall Street Journal) said it well – in a different context – that “disunity is not just the reality for democracy; it is the premise.” Why is this form of government ideal ?

      History bears this out. Whenever one party has controlled all branches of government (including, in a pragmatic sense, the Supreme Court) that party has sought to run roughshod over the populace. FDR, with huge majorities in Congress in 1937, looked to pack the Supreme Court that had been rightly hostile to the excessive government intrusions of the New Deal. (He succeeded anyway – after the 1935 Supreme Court rejection of several New Deal programs – when one judge changed his mind, followed by the retirement and replacement of another.) Carter was a personal and professional disaster notwithstanding his huge Congressional majorities. Obama is a more egregious example, because his attempted re-making of the American economy, health care system, energy policy and profligate spending were accomplished with scarcely any Republican votes – and sometimes with none at all. And in the early 2000’s when Republicans controlled both executive and legislative branches, they too had a sorry record of achievement, adding to the debt by increasing government responsibility for prescription drug payments, among other deeds.

      Conversely, since 1968, Republicans have dominated the presidency (28 years to 14 years) and forced to cooperate with mostly Democratic majorities. Nixon, Reagan and Bush I faced Democratic majorities in the House, and only Reagan merited a Republican Senate for several years of his term. Each (especially Nixon and Reagan) produced significant and transformative legislation – and only through bi-partisan efforts. Undoubtedly, the balanced budgets of the late 1990’s (for which President Clinton has long been praised) resulted from the fact that he had a Republican House that produced those budgets – Newt Gingrich, John Kasich (new governor of Ohio) and others. Everyone knows that the Constitution (Article I) gives budgetary authority to Congress, not the Chief Executive. That Republican Congress drafted those budgets, which included slightly increased social spending and a capital gains tax cut. The latter, and the revenue windfall created by the technology boom fluke of that era, balanced the budget. (The deficits of the early 2000’s were caused not by the war but primarily by the decrease in revenues after the “dot-com” bust, when the fluke was exposed and companies that had exhausted their capital went under having never manufactured a viable product or turned a profit.) All the aforementioned successes occurred with a “divided government” and there is not a chance that a Democratic Congress –enamored of deficit spending and the opportunity to “spread the wealth around” – would have allowed Clinton, even if he was so minded, to balance any budget.

     On some level “divided government” reflects the infantilized society that, if not provided immediate satisfaction, turns elsewhere for help. Economy bad under Republicans ? Vote Democrat! Economy worse under Democrats ? Vote Republican! This pattern is classically Israeli, in which society has flipped from dove to hawk and back and forth – for more than three decades. “This one will bring peace,” and when he disappoints and a wave of violence ensues, “that one will bring security.” And when the atmosphere calms down, a new peacenik arises, and the cycle repeats: Begin/Shamir, then Peres, then Shamir, then Rabin/Peres, then Netanyahu, then Barak, then Sharon/Olmert, and now Netanyahu. And so the Ferris wheel turns. President Bush II was never really as “popular” as he was said to be post-Arab terror of 9/11 – a 90% approval rating – nor ever as “unpopular” as he was said to be at the end of his tenure (high 20% range). It is just that people are flighty.

      On a deeper level, “divided government” can work better because it is an accurate reflection of a divided society. Governments that wish to retain the support of the people (and not just its base) usually operate between the 40-yard lines, avoiding dramatic changes – except after cataclysms – and seeking incremental improvements in the life of the citizenry. Political adversaries can adjust to gradual modifications in law and policy; sudden and sharp reversals will cause upheaval and dismay. That has also been the case with Israel’s unruly democracy which for years operated with the unwritten agreement that the Right would not annex the land and expel the Arabs, and the Left would not surrender land and expel the Jews. When the Left breached its side of the agreement, with the barest majority sustaining it (if it even was a majority; two right-wing legislators from the defunct Tzomet party were literally bribed with Mitsubishis and ministries and became the deciding votes for Oslo II), the shock to the Israeli political system was intense, and has not yet fully receded.

      Case in point is the tumult that erupted when President Bush II proposed allowing workers to privately invest 10% (that’s it: 10%!) of their annual Social Security contributions. This violated one of the foundations of Democratic governance: the capacity to hide massive deficits by tapping into the Social Security funds, which, until LBJ’s time, was off-budget and sacrosanct. That is no longer the case, which is why Social Security today is the largest Ponzi/Madoff scheme in history – paying today’s recipients by stealing from tomorrow’s, and worrying about tomorrow’s tomorrow. Or after the next election. Bush’s suggestion was stopped in its tracks, dead on arrival, because it breached a sacred principle of the Democratic Party: never close off any revenue stream that can fund government.

     The real question is whether President Obama has the capacity to moderate his expectations and coordinate his policy goals with the Republicans, to whom he recently referred as “enemies” (a term he eschews even for Islamic terrorists). Failed Messiahs do not compromise, or retire, easily, and cooperating with conservatives undermines two core aspects of the Democratic appeal to Americans today: the embrace of class warfare and group identity, and the imperative of having those who work and create wealth support those who don’t or won’t. The choice is his, and his best chance of re-election rests in finding some modus vivendi with Republicans. Barack Obama, meet Rand Paul.

     In sum, “divided government” can be a blessing, as it constrains the encroachment of government on the liberties of the individual and moderates the scope of government involvement in our lives. Divided government is forced to be less ambitious and heavy-handed, and that is a boon for those who work, build, create, manufacture and renew – in other words, divided government through its limitations can foster a revitalization of the American spirit.

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Posted in Contemporary Life, Current Events

The Palestinian “State”

Posted on October 26, 2010 | 5 comments

     There are persistent reports that the Palestinian Authority, unable to achieve its diplomatic goals through negotiations, is considering upping the ante and unilaterally declaring statehood. This gambit was tried once before, in 1988, and did not quite excite themselves or the international community. But what are the potential consequences of such a declaration of statehood, and how would it affect Israel’s short-term and long-term interests ?

    It should be stated that a unilateral declaration violates the Oslo Accords that specifically prohibited such actions, but Oslo has been a dead letter for so many years. Only Israel continued the charade that the agreements mattered and should be enforced. But the Accords, which, for example, prohibited terror, anti-Israel incitement in Arab schools and media, etc., have been a macabre joke for a decade and half. Few even mention it anymore, except in the context of the Yitzchak Rabin memorials. So a declaration of Palestinian statehood would not be the final nail in the coffin of Oslo (that nail has long been hammered) but just add another meter of soil on its grave, and perhaps end the pretense of its viability.

    Several questions arise, each with important ramifications: how would such a declaration be made ? If the PA simply announces its statehood, countries may or may not extend it recognition. But most of those who would recognize it already recognized it in 1988. Nothing substantive changes unless the United States recognizes a Palestinian state, which is quite possible, and would increase President Obama’s estrangement from the Jewish community. (Diehard Jewish Democrats, for whom Israel is a peripheral concern, will surely rationalize that acceptance as courageous, far-sighted and an expression of his love of Jews.) Or, the PA can seek recognition through the UN Security Council, where such a resolution can be blocked by a US veto or not blocked at all, producing the same scenario mentioned above. In such a case, it will be fascinating to see how liberal Jews contort themselves to defend a president who has put the power and prestige of the United States behind a division of Jerusalem and a severance of the Jewish national connection to Hevron, Bet Lechem, and other parts of Judea and Samaria.

     What will be the borders of such a state ? Declarations of statehood usually denote the extension of sovereignty by the declaring party over a particular population and geographical location. Declarations where the territory under the control of the new state is left undefined are uncommon, but they have occurred. If the PA, as is likely, declares its statehood at the 1967 borders, this engenders several interesting developments.

    On the positive side, Israel now would have an address to which it can respond forcefully to a terrorist attack. A nation is responsible (novel concept for these Arabs) for all acts that take place within or emanate from its territory – like Lebanon should be held responsible today for Hezbollah aggression. So a Jew attacked in Hevron can – and should – lead to the immediate leveling by Israel of the PA headquarters in Ramallah. They become the responsible party, and can no longer hide behind the fig leaf of militants, guerrillas , or organizations with phony new names and acronyms. Such a state might not last long.

     The Palestinian state would also be in the unenviable position of having to admit its essentially racist character when it asserts that Jews have no right to live there. How will European liberals tap dance around that one ? Arabs can live in the Jewish state and even be citizens, but Jews cannot live in the Arab state ? Even the UN might not be able to swallow that blatant hypocrisy, although, admittedly, the UN’s hypocrisy has thus far been limitless.

    Unfortunately, the down side is more compelling. From the perspective of the “world community” (knaves and liars, all), a State of Palestine will render all Jewish settlement illegal, and intensive pressure – probably including the threatened imposition of sanctions – will be levied on Israel unless it ethnically cleanses the area of Jews. But it is the presence of Jews in the settlements of YESHA that keep the lid on that tinderbox, and prevents the extension of terror to Israel’s coastal plane. In one simple and sobering example, a Judenrein Judea and Samaria will leave planes landing at Ben Gurion Airport vulnerable to missile attacks. And Israeli raids into that “state” would undoubtedly generate the same hostile reaction from the “world” that Israel’s foray into Gaza – in self-defense – did almost two years ago.

    One who thinks that Israel will simply be able to raid – or re-conquer – Judea and Samaria to pre-empt Arab missile attacks is engaging in wishful and fanciful thinking. (I recall a forum in DC in early 2005 in which the eminent Charles Krauthammer stated that he favored the Gaza surrender on the grounds that if the missiles from Gaza continued, Israel could then rightfully “blow it to smithereens.” When I challenged him that the “world” would object and found some pretext not to allow Israel to defend itself, he dismissed that as meaningless and unlikely. Guess again.)

    Even more menacing would be the prospect of the new “state” being internationally accepted (UN membership and all, probably fast-tracked to a seat on the Security Council which Israel has always been denied), but with the war against Israel continuing unabated on the grounds of the need to “achieve justice for the refugees.” In essence, the Arabs will be able to claim the full benefits of statehood, accept none of the consequences, and continue to abet terror in pursuit of “justice.” Worse, the legitimization of a Palestinian state will begin to undo the very legitimacy of Israel’s existence, even as the ongoing claims for justice further weaken the liberal Jew’s willingness to support Israel – already enervated by decades of assimilation, spiritual ignorance and national indifference. If the world unites around the prospect that Jerusalem, Hevron, and Bethlehem are not Jewish cities, then challenges to Tel Aviv and Haifa are not far behind.

    It is not too difficult to remember the day when Israel’s foreign policy was predicated on the notion that the existence of a Palestinian state is tantamount to the destruction of Israel. It was only 20 years ago that such a notion was universally accepted in Israel, if not among Israel’s friends. The Israelis and Oslo vitiated that concept, notwithstanding that it is as true today as it was in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, if not more true.  That stance was always buttressed by the simple, irrefutable fact that between 1948 and 1967 – when Judea, Samaria and Gaza were governed by Arab states, not by Israel – there was no Arab interest in or movement towards the creation of a State of Palestine. None – and it could have been done with the stroke of a pen, and without Israel’s consent.  The interest arose – that is to say, the farce began – only after the Six-Day War.

    Since the declaration of a State of Palestine therefore poses a mortal danger to Israel’s existence, Israel should let it be known now that such a declaration will not only void any prior agreements made with the Palestinians but will also be construed as a declaration of war, and with all the attendant consequences of a declaration of war.

   And to the unsympathetic Obama administration, Israel should state – privately and bluntly – what former PM Yitzchak Shamir told James Baker, Secretary of State for President Bush (41) and hostile to Israel to his core, when he made unreasonable demands on Israel and backed them up with threats:

“Mr. Secretary, you can demand what you choose to demand but this is our country and we will not agree to do anything that will harm its interests and future even if demanded by our best friend” (quoted by Yair Shamir, the former PM’ son, in the Jewish Press, October 13, 2010).

     That type of backbone, inner strength and unshakeable convictions will come in handy in the near future – for Israel’s leaders, for the Jewish people, and our friends across the world.

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Posted in Contemporary Life, Current Events, Israel, Jewish History