Tag Archives: Netanyahu

Let’s Keep It That Way

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These days when much of the world is closely watching events in Israel, I want to say that, numerous and serious as the problems are, I remain proud of my country. Here is a short list of the reasons why; for a longer one see my 2010 book, The Land of Blood and Honey.

Back in 1914 there were only about 50,000 Jews living in the small, backward, badly neglected and badly governed, country that was then part of the Ottoman Empire. As late as the 1950s, so thinly populated were the environments of Tel Aviv that, visiting my grandparents, I could hear the jackals howl at night. The jackals have long disappeared, a fact that I, recalling the well-publicized cases of rabies among children in particular, can only call a blessing. The Jewish population has grown to about seven million (Arabs and other nationalities included, the total number of Israeli citizens living in-country is about nine million). Few if any other countries have done as well.

Back in 1914 Palestine’s Jews only formed a tiny fraction of the world’s Jewish population, which probably stood at about 13,500,000. Now, if the figures are correct, they form slightly over half of the total. Meaning that Zionism is well on its way to realize its great dream. Namely, in the words of Israel’s national anthem, to make Jews a free people in their own land: the land of Zion and Jerusalem.

In developed countries where contraceptives are easily available and women have a choice, one very good index of people’s confidence in the future is their willingness to have and raise children. Today the average Israeli Jewish female will have 3.05 children during her lifetime, as against the OECD average of 1.65.

Back in 1914 the Zionist Movement’s leading economic expert, Arthur Rupin, estimated that per capita product here in Palestine stood at only about 4 percent of the American figure. 99 years later, the figure is 75 percent. Almost 40 percent of Israel’s GDP are exported—a figure very much like that of a heavily industrialized modern country such as Germany.

As well as having a strong economy, which for a number of years before COVID threw everything out of gear was widely held up as the most successful in the world, Israel built up a powerful military. One armed with the most up to-date weapons and weapon systems and capable, as it has repeatedly shown, of defending the country against larger powers and even combinations of such powers. Considering that the first Jewish self-defense organization in Palestine peaked at just 40 members who rode horses and were armed with nothing but rifles and shabarias (a type of Arab curved knife, much beloved by Bedouin in particular), this has been an amazing achievement.

The Quran calls Jews “the People of the Book.” To practice their religion Jewish males, and to a lesser extent Jewish women, need to be literate so they can read from the Pentateuch as well as the prayer book. As a result, Jews have always tended to be much more literate than their gentile neighbors. Zionism, an urban movement par excellence, embraced this tradition. With the result that, starting from the movement’s early days, Jews in Palestine/Israel were much more literate than non-European peoples in practically any other part of the world. Today Israel is the fifth most-educated country in the world. From kindergarten to universities and research institutes, its education system can compete with practically any of its opposite numbers elsewhere.

At my home, in a mountainous area west of Jerusalem, I have in my possession some photographs taken by the German air force during World War I. As they show, at that time there was not a tree in sight; nothing but rocks and more rocks. As German Emperor Wilhelm II noted when he visited in 1898, “a terrible country, without water and without shade.” Since then Israel has become the only country in the world that, in spite of repeated setbacks (some of them occasioned by Arabs, Israeli or Palestinian, who deliberately set fire to forests) has more trees in 2023 than it did a century earlier.

A British-written guidebook to Palestine, issued by the War Office in 1941-42 for the use of British soldiers on leave from fighting the Germans in the Western Desert, said that “the first thing you’ll notice is how arid the country is.” Today, thanks in part to the use of large-scale desalination, this basically arid country has enough of the previous liquid not only to meet its own needs but those of other countries as well. Some of the water in question is exported, notably to Jordan. The rest is distilled on the spot with the aid of Israeli technology.

Like practically every other country, Israel is no stranger to corruption. Sources put it at the 31st place out of 180. Nothing to be very proud of, but better than five out of six countries in total.

Of well over a hundred countries that got their independence since 1948, Israel is one of the very few that has always been democratic in the sense that regular elections were held. Except in 1973, when the Arab-Israeli War of that time led to a short postponement, all the elections were held on time. All were held following lively electoral campaigns in which almost every point of view was represented and could be freely uttered. That even includes the notorious ones of November 2022. Not once were elections marked by serious disorder, let alone violence. Not once was there any question of the large-scale stuffing of ballots and the like. For me personally casting my vote has become something of a ritual—a slightly festive occasion to meet friend and neighbors whose existence one might otherwise have forgotten.

True, Israel does not have a constitution. But neither does Britain, “the mother of democracies.” True, Netanyahu & Co. want judges to be appointed by politicians. But that is exactly the way American supreme justices ones are. True, he wants to pass legislation that will prevent prime ministers from being prosecuted as long as they remain in office; but that is just how things are done in France. This list could be extended almost indefinitely.

Meanwhile –

Week after week, hundreds of thousands of Israelis have been taking to the streets in an effort to preserve what they (and I) see as their liberal-democratic way of life. So far, the presence in the cabinet of some true firebrands notwithstanding, without any serious violence.

In terms of happiness, Israel occupies place No. 12 out of 180.

Let’s keep it that way.

There Once Was a Lady of Riga

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There is an Israeli named Benjamin Netanyahu. Born in 1949, American-educated (MIT) and an excellent showman, he attracted the attention of Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, served 1983–1984 and 1986–1992) who appointed him head of the Israeli mission to the United Nations in New York. Joining Likud, the right-wing, rather hawkish, movement that, at that time, was contesting election after election with the more left wing, slightly less hawkish, Labor Party, subsequently he held all kinds of portfolios the most important of which was that of minister of finance. In 1996 he became prime minister for the first time. Since then he has been in that office on and off, clocking a total of fifteen years. More than any of his predecessors in Israel, and more than the vast majority of his peers in other democratic countries.

The latest elections were held on 1 November 2022. They gave him and his potential partners a clear majority in parliament and enabled him to set up a government, the sixth if I am not mistaken. But only in combination with a number of much smaller parties, some religious-orthodox, others right-wing extremist. The religious parties demanded, and to a considerable extent obtained, their long-standing demands. Including legal changes that will make it much harder for some classes of diaspora Jews to gain recognition as such, come to Israel, and become citizens. Other changes recognize the Torah Pentateuch) as a fundamental pillar of Israeli life; provide heavy subsidies for yeshive students, some 175,000 of whom are now receiving stipends that enable them to live (well, more or less) without working; put an end to any further improvements in the status of gay, lesbian and trans people;; and enacting all kinds of restrictive laws concerning kosher food, public transport on the Sabbath, education, and more. The most extreme measure—one which, thankfully, has not been implemented yet—is a law that will enable parliament to overrule any court decision by a simple majority of 61. Not good for democracy and the rule of law, many people say.

But why, the reader who is not an Israeli might ask, should he/she/they/whatever concern themselves with these things? After all, Israel is a sovereign state. Like all other states it has the right to institute its own set of laws, however quirky they may be. If those Jews want to exempt certain classes of their citizens from military service, or pay them for not working, or make all males cover their heads at all times, or prevent non-kosher food from being sold throughout the country, or welcome convicted criminals into the cabinet, then who are the gentiles to complain?

The trouble is that things do not end there. One change that has been agreed upon, more or less, is to take responsibility for securing the land bordering on Jerusalem towards the north, east and south away from the army and entrust it to the police instead. The police itself will be under the control of a ministry headed by Mr. Itamar Ben Gvir, an extreme right-winger. His appointment as “minister of national security” will certainly do nothing to improve relationships between Jews and Palestinians. Worse still, it may one day have terrifying implications for the rule of law as applied to Israel’s own population, both Arab and Jewish.

Other measures include putting the (very few), settlements that, following a decision by Israel’s Supreme Court, had to be evacuated in the past back on the map. Rebuilding them, re-populating them, and using any opportunity for expanding them. As well as unfreezing the ban on building new settlements in the northern part of the West Bank, one originally put in place by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert (2006-9) in the hope of perhaps facilitating peace with the Palestinians. Each of these measures separately is fairly minor and will make little difference to “reality on the ground” as Israelis like to say. Together, though, they mean putting more obstacles in front of any hope, however vague and however remote, of one day reconciling Israelis and Palestinians or at least preventing hostilities between them from escalating.

Perhaps more than at any other time in the past, Netanyahu himself seems to be aware of these problems and worried lest they alienate not just some of Israel’s supporters abroad but some of Likud’s voters as well. Presumably that is why starting almost immediately after the elections, he has been working furiously to postpone their implementation as much as he can; and anyone who knows Netanyahu knows that, with him as with any other number of politicians in any number of countries, postponement is often equivalent to rejection.

Both abroad and at home, many people dislike Netanyahu. If not for his policies then for his arrogance, his penchant for living it up at the expense of others, his tendency to make promises without any intention of keeping them, and his meddlesome wife who, at time, gives the impression of being half demented. Still at the moment he seems to be the only one who can hold Israel’s extremists at bay, more or less. Should he fail—and he is not getting any younger—then the following verses may very well apply:

There once was a lady of Riga

Who went for a ride on a tiger.

They came back from the ride

With the lady inside

And a smile on the face of the tiger.

My Bowels! My Bowels! I Cannot Hold My Peace

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(Jeremiah 4.19)

My parents brought me to this country when I was just four years old. That was back in 1950; I can still remember the taxi that took us from the airport to our new home, the laid table, and the first Hebrew word (mayim, water) I learnt. Sabbaticals etc. apart, since then Israel is where I have spent my entire life. Not because I had no choice. I also have a Dutch passport and was sufficiently well-known, professionally, to find work in many places around the world. But because I wanted to. Some time ago I asked my father, a Holocaust survivor who since then has passed way at the age of 99, why he had taken his young family from Europe to the Middle East. “So as not to feel Jewish,” he shot back at me.

Looking back, I cannot remember even one day when Israel was not “under threat.” The Arab threat (this was long before anyone had heard of Palestinians). The Egyptian threat (in the early 1950s it was called “the second round;” we children even used to play a board game by that name). The Syrian threat. The Jordanian threat. The Palestinian threat. The Soviet threat. The Iraqi threat. The PLO threat. The Hezbollah threat. The Hamas Threat. The Iranian threat. The political threat. The economic threat. The military threat. The guerilla threat. The terrorist threat. More than enough threats to make anyone’s head spin! Some of the threats were very serious, some less so, a few almost entirely imaginary.

Again looking back I think that, on the whole, Israel has coped admirably. The obstacles notwithstanding, this sliver of a country has seen its population going up more than a tenfold. Its economy is flourishing—just look at what happened to the shekel, once nicknamed the drekel (little piece of dirt), over the last ten years or so. Year by year, the number of foreign visitors is breaking all records. The country which during its first decades was desperately begging for capital is now exporting it to many places around the world. Israeli science and technology are among the most advanced anywhere. Israel is the only country that has more trees than it did a hundred years ago. Relative to the size of the population, more new books are published in Israel each year than anywhere else. And the Israeli military is among the most powerful of all. For which thank God, or else the country would undoubtedly look like Syria does.
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In many ways, a good place to live and raise one’s children as I have done and as I hope my children will do. Above all, a rambunctious place where everyone has long been free to come out with what he (or, for God’s sake, she) thinks—five Jews, ten opinions, as the saying goes. If Israeli Arabs choose to join the cacophony, then in this author’s opinion at any rate so much the better. But things are changing. A year ago—how fast time seems to flow—I wrote of Dareen Tatour. She is the Israeli Arab woman who was jailed for writing a poem in which she called on the Palestinians to resist the Israeli occupation (see my post, “The Fourth Reich is Rising,” 19.10.2017). Today there is talk of trying people for believing and saying that the only way to save Israel from itself is by applying pressure from outside; pressure to find some way to end the occupation, of course. Too, the relevant cabinet committee has approved a bill that will deny government funding from any “cultural product” that “undermines” Israel’s identify as a “Jewish and democratic state” and “desecrates” the state’s symbols.

Both bills smell to high heaven. So far neither has become law. Should either or both of them pass, however, they may very well prove to be a first step on a slippery slope that leads—well, we all know where. So let me say, for the benefit of anyone who may or may not be listening: I have never accepted, not will ever accept, a single penny for running this blog. Nor do I know whether my posts and other works count as “cultural products.” Presumably not, because the line I have followed is strictly politically incorrect; but that is the last of my worries.

Following in the tradition of Jeremiah the prophet, though, I shall not give up my freedom to think and say and write and post whatever I want. Not for the Knesset, should it enact the laws in question. Not for the courts, should they try to enforce them. Not even for the bunch of right-wing Jewish Mafiosi in- and out of the Knesset who keep barking at anyone who differs with them.

My bowels! My bowels! I cannot hold my peace.

Whom the Gods Want to Destroy…

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IDF-Soldier-who-shot-neutralized-terrorist-is-suspected-of-murder-Israel-PalestineThe killing last week by an Israeli soldier of a wounded Palestinian terrorist who was lying helplessly on his back has sent the country into a turmoil. No sooner was the picture published on the Net then the Israeli media mounted a wave of protest. Taking up from there, Prime Minister Netanyahu, Minister of Defense Yeelon, and chief of staff Eisenkot quickly denounced the deed and promised that the soldier in question would be put on trial and punished. This was followed by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) attorney general’s announcement that the charge would be murder.

Israelis like to think that theirs is “the most moral army in the world.” Consequently there was much palaver about the IDF’s “ethos,” its “values,” and so on. But not everyone agreed that the killer was in fact being treated as he deserved to be. Not only did his family and friends stand by him, but images of him, in handcuffs, led to an equally strong wave of protest in his support accompanied by rioting. That caused Netanyahu, a weathervane if ever one there was, to soften his original stance on the case pending a court investigation. Not content with that, right-wing politicians, smelling blood, entered the fray. They lionized the soldier and accused the chief of staff of failing to back his troops. One notorious extreme right-wing activist, Itamar Ben Gvir, demanded that the police investigate Be-Tzelem, the humanitarian organization responsible for taking the image and spreading it. One rabbi has even suggested that, for having the soldier tried, the chief of staff himself should be put on trial.

In his defense, the soldier claimed that the terrorist was moving and that he was afraid that he, the terrorist, might be carrying an explosive belt on his body. This was denied by the man’s commanders and made doubtful by the fact that the terrorist, who had been lying there for no fewer than six minutes before he was killed, had been examined and found unarmed. As always happens in such situations, charges and countercharges quickly multiplied until they congealed into a single opaque, stinking, tissue of truths and falsehoods. I do not know what the outcome is going to be. But I am prepared to bet that the soldier will not be punished as murderers in Israel usually are, i.e. with life in prison. Assuming he is punished at all, almost certainly he will get a pardon of some kind.

All this is still in the future. Meanwhile the fallout from the case is splitting Israeli society from top to bottom. Not to mention other soldiers’ justified fear that, should they be caught in a similar situation or commit a similar deed, their superiors, instead of backing them up, will wash their hands of them. To be sure, the State of Israel and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) are not the world’s worst human rights offenders. Unfortunately, though, they are bad enough.

Sun Tzu, in the first chapter of his celebrated On War, says that victory will go to the side who keeps the favor of heaven—meaning, the moral advantage—by formulating rules of behavior and sticking to them. I agree. For those of you who have never read my best-known book, The Transformation of War, or who have forgotten its contents, here is what I wrote about this topic a quarter century ago:

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“[Suppose a war] where one belligerent is much stronger than the other. Under such circumstances, the conduct of war can become problematic even as a matter of definition… Over the long run… fighting the weak demeans those who engage in it, and therefore undermines its own purpose. He who loses out to the weak loses; he who triumphs over the weak also loses. In such an enterprise there can be neither profit nor honor. Provided only the exercise is repeated often enough, as surely as night follows day the point will come when enterprise collapses… Since the very act of fighting the weak invites excess, in fact is excess, it obliges the strong to impose controls in the forms of laws, regulations, and rules of engagement… The net effect of such regulations is to demoralize the troops who are prevented from operating freely and using their initiative. They are contrary to sound command practice if they are observed and subversive of fighting discipline of they are not. Hence Clausewitz’s dictum, plainly observable in every low-intensity conflict fought since World War I, that regular troops combating a Volkskrieg are like robots to men.

A sword, plunged into salt water, will rust…A strong force made to confront the weak for any length of time will violate its own regulations and commit crimes, some inadvertent and others not. Forced to lie in order to conceal its crimes, it will find the system of military justice undermined, the process of command distorted, and a credibility gap opening up at its feet. In such a process there are neither heroes nor villains, but only victims: whom the gods want to destroy, they first strike blind.”

Mr. Netanyahu, are you listening? For God’s sake, GET OUT OF THE TERRITORIES!!!

In Re. Iran

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Like most people, I am not terribly familiar with the complicated rules that govern the way the US Congress works and votes. Unlike most people, in re. Iran I do not think it matters very much. That is why I allow myself to look into the future as best I can. images

  1. Whatever happens, the Mullahs are not going to give up their nuclear program. Partly that is because of the number of times the US has waged war in or against foreign countries over the last half century or so. Partly because, not counting the US forces in the Gulf, they have three nuclear neighbors right in their backyard; and partly because Israel, which is not an NPT member, has repeatedly threatened to bomb them. That does not mean they are going to test any time soon. What it does mean is that they will continue to shape the program in such a way as to allow them to build the weapons fairly quickly in case they feel under threat. They will also continue to build increasingly sophisticated delivery vehicles in the form of ballistic missiles and, perhaps, cruise missiles.
  2. Whatever happens, the same Mullahs are not going to drop their bomb, if and when they have it, on anyone. No more so than the other members of the nuclear club, i.e. the US, the Soviet Union/Russia, Britain, France, China, Israel, India, Pakistan and North Korea (which has recently resolved the latest of its countless crises with the South) did. It is indeed possible that the Iranians, in an attempt to further their political interests, will threaten to use the bomb. If so, however, they will hardly be able to do so in more crude and blatant a way than Truman did in 1948, Khruschev in 1956, Kennedy in 1962, Nixon in 1973, and so on and so on.
  3. Whatever happens, several other countries in the Middle East are going to push their nuclear programs forward. Just so as to be on the safe side. Among them are Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and perhaps Jordan as well. The only question is, how fast they will proceed and how long it will take them to produce results (whatever that may mean).

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  4. Whatever happens, Iran’s nuclear program will continue to figure large in the ongoing wars between Democrats and the Republicans. Considering that elections are only a little more than a year away, and also the importance of the Jewish-American vote, this is just too good an issue for either side to drop. And even should they want to do so, there will always be Netanyahu to stir up things and ensure that they don’t.
  5. Whatever happens, the sanctions will gradually come to an end. Already now Russia, by agreeing to sell Iran SA-300 surface-to-air missiles, has occasioned a major breach in the international consensus. Delegations from China, Germany, France and Japan are flooding Tehran, seeking opportunities for trade. Pressure in this direction can only increase. History will not stand still merely because President Obama cannot agree with Congress, or the other way around. At a time when the world economy seems to be faltering, by and large the return to normalcy is a good thing. It should cause the price of oil to fall. Until it starts rising again, of course.
  6. Whatever happens, and occasional talk about an eventual nuclear-free Middle East notwithstanding, Israel will continue to maintain a formidable nuclear arsenal. One fully capable of wiping out Iran and/or quite some other countries within striking range of its ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, fighter-bombers, and submarines. Probably meaning, even without taking the submarines into account, at least three and a half thousand kilometers from Tel Aviv.
  7. Whatever happens, Netanyahu, as long as he stays in power, will continue to huff and puff about the “Iranian threat” and the urgent need to counter it. Partly he will do so in order to impress his electorate which, following years of sustained propaganda, has become paranoid and believes that no Iranian ever thinks of anything except for getting to paradise with its seventy-two “big breasted” virgins. And partly because, each time he does so, the spigots open and Israel gets more and more weapons from the US and Germany in particular. Speaking to the New York Times, Obama personally has offered help in building “a successor to Iron Dome.” Israeli reports also have it that he is prepared to help in finding solutions to the problem posed by the “attack tunnels” Hamas, and perhaps Hezbollah, are digging along the borders of the Gaza Strip and Southern Lebanon respectively.
  8. Whatever happens, Netanyahu, as long as he stays in power, will not launch an offensive against Iran. Partly that is because some of his advisers have repeatedly told him that such a strike may very well fail to achieve its aim. Partly because of the fear of Iranian retaliation, which is certain to follow; and partly because he knows that the US opposes to such a strike and may not rush to his assistance in case he runs into difficulties. Above all, however, it is because, as the so-called Barak tapes have recently shown once again, the man does not have the necessary guts. The only opponents he will wage war on are very weak ones such as Hamas.

And once he is gone? Remember that, a decade ago, Netanyahu’s predecessor, Ariel Sharon, a much braver man than he, also threatened to attack Iran. And that nothing came of it at that time either.

And Everything Else be Damned

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netanyahu-speaks-at-un-about-iranian-bomb-2Most people think that the recent fracas between Jerusalem and Washington is about Iran. They are wrong. Should Israel and Iran engage in a nuclear exchange, says U.S Middle East expert Anthony Cordesman, then it is the latter and not the former that will be wiped off the map. Nor are the mullahs unaware of that fact. That has not prevented Israel from talking about destroying Iran’s nuclear infrastructure. Both Netanyahu and his predecessors have been doing so for over a decade. Since success depends on surprise—as when it bombed the Iraqi reactor in 1981 and the Syrian one in 2007—this talk itself proves it has no serious intention of carrying out its threats. Nor is Netanyahu the man to do it. For all his frequent posturing, he does not have the guts.

The threat a nuclear Iran would pose to the United States is much smaller still. In fact it would be comparable to the one mounted by North Korea since it detonated its first device nine years ago; meaning, close to zero. Arguably, indeed, possession of the bomb would compel Tehran to become more cautious than, by most measures, it already is. Thus the bomb would contribute to stability in the Middle East, not detract from it. That, at any rate, is what, to-date, nuclear weapons have done in every single region where they have been introduced.

Amidst these questions, whether Netanyahu is or is not supported by his own security service is small potatoes. As former U.S Secretary of State Henry Kissinger once said, Israel does not really have a foreign policy. All it has are internal politics of which foreign policy is a third-rate extension. It is mainly internal politics that have driven Netanyahu to emphasize the Iranian “threat.” Not without success. Only yesterday a neighbor of mine, a highly-educated lawyer, told me that, much as he disliked Netanyahu, he was going to vote for him because of the threat in question.

Which reminds us that, in Israel, it is elections time. The last two elections were held in 2009 and 2013. In neither of them was there any question but that Likud would win and Netanyahu hold on to his dearly-beloved job. This time things are different. One reason for this is that, economically speaking, things are not going as well as they should. The outcome is high prices—for a couple of years now, not a day has passed without the media publishing comparisons with other countries, almost all of them unfavorable to Israel. In particular, the burden on young couples out to purchase their first flat has become all but intolerable.

The other reason is the creation of a new left-center party under the joint leadership of Yitzhak Herzog and former foreign minister Tziporah (“Tzippi”) Livni. Both Herzog and Livni have the charisma of earthworms. Many people, though, see them as preferable to Netanyahu who is regarded as glib and untrustworthy.

Netanyahu needs a boost. There is not much he can do about prices. Nor do people really believe him when he says, as he has been doing for some years, that he will do something. But he can try to strike poses in foreign relations. The murder a couple of weeks ago of four Jews in a French kosher supermarket seemed to present him with a great opportunity to do just that. What could be better than to be photographed while marching arm in arm with other heads of state, acting not merely as the Prime Minister of Israel but as the head of the Jewish people world-wide?

Unfortunately for him, it all went wrong. President Hollande of France, it turned out, did not really want him there. To be sure, he could hardly prohibit Netanyahu from coming. But he did take the opportunity to humiliate him by failing to receive him at the Elysée Palace. Worse still, when Netanyahu arrived there was no proper reception-party waiting to take him from the airport to town. Israel TV showed him standing in the rain, umbrella over his head, waiting for a bus and looking forlorn. Elections or not, that is not the kind of image a prime minister wants or needs.

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So what to do? Unlike former Prime Ministers Menahem Begin, Yitzhak Rabin, and Ariel Sharon, Netanyahu cannot claim credit for any important foreign policy deed. Like his one-time mentor, former Prime-Minister Yitzhak Shamir, all he can do is try and maintain the status quo. Partly that is because he does not have the necessary authority over his own party and the Israeli right in general. Partly because, as I said, he just doesn’t have the guts. But maintaining the status quo does not yield many votes. At any rate not enough to make him feels secure.

So use your Jewish-American card. Get yourself invited to the U.S. If not to the White House, with whose occupant Netanyahu has long been at loggerheads, then to address both Houses of Congress. The procedure is somewhat unusual, but that does not bother the prime minister too much. After all, the U.S, too, is facing elections in less than two years. Consequently the pressure it can bring to bear on Israel is limited. It is even possible that, by seeming to twist President Barak Obama’s arm, Netanyahu will actually gain some points with parts of the electorate.

And so it goes. Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry will huff and puff. Presumably more so behind closed doors than in public. They may even threaten to “reconsider” America’s relationship with Israel. As, for example, Gerald Ford and Kissinger did in 1975 when Rabin did not agree to a proposed interim agreement with Egypt. However, real change will only happen, if it does, after the next American elections.

By that time Netanyahu will be safely back in the saddle, or so he hopes. And everything else be damned.

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Israel at 66

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By most accounts the state of Israel, which celebrated its 66th birthday last week is a good place to live in. A hundred years ago there were some sixty thousand Jews in what Israelis, following Old Testament usage, like to call Ha-Aretz, “The Land.” Currently there are some six million. No other country, not even the United States or any developing country, has seen such a tremendous increase in such a short time.

According to various international sources, per capita GDP—probably the best available index of relative wealth—stands at about $ 33,000 per year. That is 64 percent of the U.S figure. Considering that, as far as the best available estimates allow, a century ago the equivalent figure was just 4 percent, that is not a bad performance. Moreover, as tourists will notice, the Israeli shekel, while not quite freely convertible, has become as hard as stone. $ 33,000 put Israel in place 25 out of 194 countries on this earth, just behind New Zealand but ahead of quite some other members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Considering its size, in terms of computer science, material science, medical science, the number of patents taken out each year, the number of new books published, the number of museums, and, recently the number of Nobel laureates Israel has nothing to be ashamed of.

The demographic picture is also interesting. Israel attracts immigrants—considering the size of its population, it occupies place number four among 36 “developed” countries. Not only do immigrants provide labor, but they may help create an open-minded country with a vibrant, multifaceted, culture. The percentage of those who live in wedlock is relatively high, that of divorces low; this preference for family life may explain why the suicide rate is also quite low. The number of children per woman is much higher than the average in OECD countries. The life expectancy of both men and women is also higher. Though many orthodox men and many Arab women do not work, overall participation in the labor forces is higher than the OECD average.

But who said Israel should be compared with developed countries of roughly similar size such as Sweden, Switzerland, or the Netherlands? After all, it is located neither in Western Europe, nor in North America, nor in happy Oceania. Instead, its founders have chosen one of the least stable, most turbulent, regions on earth. Considering these facts, and also that it used to be a colonial country that only gained its independence in 1948, perhaps a better comparison would be with the world’s remaining 160 or so “developing” countries. Such a comparison will show that Israel towers head and shoulders over practically all the rest. The more so in view of the fact that it has never known a single day when it was officially at peace with all its neighbors; and the more so in view of the fact that, of all the 100-plus countries that gained their independence since World War II, only India, Malta and Israel have always maintained their democracy.

To be sure, there are problems. By and large, though, they are the problems of rich developed countries, not of poor developing ones. At one time Israel used to be a socialist society with an exceptionally low Gini coefficient (the graph that measures economic inequality among different parts of the population). This started changing in the mid-1980s, leading up to the present situation where the gaps between rich and poor are said to be larger than anywhere else except the U.S. The environment is not protected too well—it took public opinion and the government quite a while to realize how important this issue is. The level of educational achievement, as distinct from the average number of years spent at school, is not among the highest either. Like so many other developed countries Israel is attracting large numbers of illegal immigrants who enter it in search of work and with whom it does not quite know what to do.

The most important problems of all are defense on one hand and the occupied territories on the other. The continuing need for defense is reflected in the country’s exceptionally powerful armed forces. Those forces consume about 7 percent of GDP compared with about 4.5 percent in the U.S, 4.4 in Russia, and around 1 percent in most European countries. They pack an enormous punch that might well be the envy of much larger forces.

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Yet things have changed. From 1948 to 1973 inclusive Israel was a beleaguered fortress that stumbled from one major war to the next. Since then the existential threat has receded to the point where, in spite of much foolish talk about Iran’s nuclear program, it barely any longer exists. To be sure, there is some terrorism, whether in the form of knifings, shootings, suicide bombers, and the like or in that of rockets coming across the border. Another war against Hezbollah, Hamas, or both cannot be ruled out. Such a war, however, would probably not amount to much more than pinpricks.

That leaves the major, major problem of the occupied territories. What brought the territories under Israeli rule back in 1967 was an Arab threat that was perceived as existential and led to a preemptive war. Thanks to the leadership and courage displayed first by Menahem Begin and then by Ariel Sharon, Israel has rid itself of most of them. Most of the time, the border with those areas is reasonably quiet. Had it been completely quiet, then those Israelis, and there are many, who favor a withdrawal from other territories would have had a much, much easier time persuading the rest.

Several Israeli prime ministers have made unsuccessful attempts to achieve peace with Syria which would include the return of the Golan Heights to that country. Just who is to blame for the failure of those attempts need not concern us here; as long as the Syrian civil war continues, there will be nobody to negotiate with. That leaves the West Bank and the Arab-inhabited parts of East Jerusalem. How many people live in those areas is not clear. Almost three million, says the Palestinian Authority. Rather less than 2 million, say some Israeli demographers. Either way, the situation whereby Israel keeps such large numbers of Palestinians under its rule is intolerable—not militarily, but politically, socially, psychologically, legally, and, last not least, morally. As the growth of Jewish terrorism proves, in the long run it may very well lead to civil war. One might compare Israel to a policeman who is chained to a criminal. “I am free,” he keeps shouting; “but he [the criminal] is not.”

How to break the stalemate? Netanyahu, whom many consider both a liar and a coward, will not do so. If only because the Right will prevent such a move, neither will the Left. What is needed is another Rabin, another Begin, another Sharon or even another Olmert (during his term as prime minister, he was planning to give up at least part of the West Bank). It was not that the times called for them; it was they who changed or tried to change the times. At the moment no such figure may be seen on the horizon.

But then hasn’t Ha-Aretz always been the land where miracles sometimes happen?