Friends Forever? by Ira Schwartz

If the Arabs put down their weapons today there would be no more violence.

If the Jews put down their weapons today there would be no more Israel.

If the Jews all gather in Israel, it will save us the trouble of going after them worldwide.--Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, leader of Hezbollah

We are not fighting so that you will offer us something. We are fighting to eliminate you.--Hussein Massawi, former head of the Hezbollah, about the Western world

The Jews are the cancer spreading all over the world...the Jews are a virus like AIDS hitting humankind...Jews are responsible for all wars and conflicts....Do not ask what Germany did to the Jews but what the Jews did to Germany. True, the Germans killed and burned Jews but the Jews exaggerate the numbers to gain propaganda advantages and sympathy….--Sheikh Ibrahim Mudairis, May 13, 2005, Gaza

The simple fact of the matter is that there is no such thing on the planet as sympathy for and identification with Palestinians. There is no such thing as pro-Palestinianism. Period. When Palestinians, or when Arabs in general, are mistreated, repressed and tormented by any Arab regime, no one cares. When Palestinians were mass murdered by Syria and Jordan, no one cared. When more than 100,000 Arab civilians are massacred in Algeria, it does not even make the evening news. When Asad or Saddam Hussein carried out mass murders of Arabs, the Human Rights lobby never looked up from its cinnamon latte.--Steven E. Plaut, PhD, professor of business administration, Graduate School of Business, University of Haifa

We can forgive the Arabs for killing our children. We cannot forgive them for forcing us to kill their children. We will only have peace with the Arabs when they love their children more than they hate us.--Golda Meir in 1977

How can you think about building a better future... if you indoctrinate your children to a culture of death?--Hillary Clinton

That is just a little look into the emotions that drive the conflicts in the Middle East. It’s not a pretty picture, hatred never is. Since Israel’s birth in 1948 this small country has fought seven wars against vastly superior enemies. They have won them all. They had no choice because each war fought was a war against an enemy that was seeking Israel’s total destruction. With the help of the United States the Israeli government has built the finest standing army in the Middle East. This is one of the reasons the fragile peace has lasted as long as it has. The other is far more sinister; Israel has nukes their surrounding Arab neighbors as yet do not.

When Israel declared its independence in 1948, US President Harry Truman was the first world leader to recognize the new country. It took just eleven minutes. 51 years later Israel is still one of our closest allies. Let’s look into a few of the reasons for this close friendship.

In an area where political assassinations, military coups and constant tribal feuding is the norm Israel is the sole democracy. As a democracy Israel is committed to the same standards as the United States in regards to its peoples; freedom, equality and tolerance for all regardless of religion, race or gender. Even though Israel was established as a homeland for the Jewish people, it like the United States is a melting pot of many, including Arabs and Muslims. All Israeli citizens enjoy full and equal rights. 24% of the Israeli population is Muslim. 20% is Arab; of this 24% are Palestinian. On the opposite side of the fence, and this is only a guesstimate by the UN since all the Arab nations refuse to release any figures, there are only 5,000 Jews living as citizens in all of the surrounding Arab countries. Of the 5,000 few have any rights and must pray in secret in fear for their lives.

During “Desert Storm” Israel was being pummeled by Iraqi Scud missiles. The U.S. asked Israel not to retaliate for fear of damaging the fragile coalition. They did what we asked and suffered millions of dollars in damage, several killed and hundreds injured. That’s what friends do for one another. How many of our “other” allies would have done that? You could count them on one hand with a couple of fingers left over.

When the discussions with Iran fail, and they eventually will, it will be Israeli aircraft that take out the Iranian nuclear reactors not US fighters. Again we will publicly condemn them for this but privately applaud them for doing what we could not do without starting another war. Why would they do this? Because that’s what friends do.

But sometimes being a friend involves tough love. During a 1938 speech, the father of Israel, David Ben Gurion spoke,

"Let us not ignore the truth among ourselves ... politically we are the aggressors and they defend themselves... The country is theirs, because they inhabit it, whereas we want to come here and settle down, and in their view we want to take away from them their country."

Our present administration requested Israel, for the sake of restarting the peace negotiations with the Palestinians, to cease all settlement construction in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The Israeli’s countered that this new construction is needed for the natural growth of its population. If this doesn’t sound familiar it should. Our government used the same excuse as it expanded west and displaced all the Native American’s that lived there. Right or wrong it is to this day an ugly scare in the history of the United States. But growing countries need to expand and Israel is growing.

“We regret the reports of Israel’s plans to approve additional settlement construction,” Robert Gibbs, the White House spokesman, said. “As the President has said before, the United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued settlement expansion and we urge it to stop.”

Another US official said: “In the end America will be forced to do what is necessary to bring the Israelis and the Palestinians back to the negotiation table. But the Netanyahu Government has proven difficult to work with.”

New settlement growth has been one of the main sticking points to the peace talks. The Israeli settlements, built on land marked for a future Palestinian state, are strongly supported by most of the Israelis that elected Mr. Netanyahu. Politics again stands in the way of peace. Another factor Israel has in common with the United States.

Even though we don’t always see eye to eye, it is good to have such a strong friend in a region where you constantly need someone to watch your back. And Israel has proven time and time again they’ve got our back and much, much more. The only question left is will we continue to watch theirs?