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Why the USA is a close friend of Israel
MORALITY AND THE LAW CXL
By Stephen Ellis
WHY ISRAEL
Nobody asked me, but…
The other day, a (legal) Mexican worker was doing some work for my wife and me at our home, and he asked me a few questions: “Why is the United States government always talking about Israel? Why does our government always seem to favor Israel? Why don’t they offer other countries the same coverage in our media?”
To answer these questions properly, you need to explain a lot more than the simplistic response of, “The Jewish population in America has a very strong lobby in Washington”. It’s true that the Israeli lobby is strong, but so is the Saudi lobby, so is the Iranian lobby, so is the China lobby, etc. Why Israel?
To really explain it, we need to go back to 1946, following WWII when the British were occupying what was then called Palestine. Although the Jewish population in Palestine was very sizable, the Arab population was even larger. Pursuant to the Balfour Declaration of 1917, the Jews, who had been prosecuted by the Nazis, and almost half their population exterminated in the Nazi death camps, were promised a homeland of their own where they could worship, as Jews, without fear of prosecution.
The British, trying to get rid of the Palestinian problem, at first offered to create two separate States: one called Palestine (for the Arabs) and one called Israel (for the Jews). The Jewish population agreed, but the larger Arab population did not. So, in keeping with the Balfour Declaration, the British designated one single State called Israel, and immediately ordered all their troops to evacuate the area. The British had been informed that as soon as the State of Israel was declared, all of the neighboring Arab countries were going to invade Israel and exterminate the Jewish population. So, having declared the independent State of Israel, the British hurriedly evacuated this new State and got their troops and diplomats out of Israel in a record “one day”. The stated British policy was that they had done their duty and whatever happened after that was none of their concern.
Immediately, the Arab armies of Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Iraq invaded Israel determined to exterminate the Jewish population and take Israel for themselves.
What happened is a matter of historical record: The Israelis, fighting for their very existence beat back the onslaught of Arab troops outnumbering the Israelis thirty-to-one. Defeated, the Arab armies negotiated a truce establishing Israel’s borders and Israel agreed that their capital, Jerusalem ,would be a divided city owned half by Israel and half by Jordan. There were millions of Arabs who fled Israel fearing that living under Jewish rule would be a terrible thing. Most fled to the strip of land known as Gaza while others fled to Jordan and the West Bank. Fleeing Israel was a costly mistake that the Arabs would suffer for many years to come. While Israel grew and flourished, both Gaza and the West Bank became filthy, crime ridden, refugee camps.
Having won a war against almost insurmountable odds, Israel captured the imagination of the Americans. Israel was the little “David” who felled the giant “Goliath” of the highly-touted Arab armies. The U.S.A. became a huge fan of Israel. The Arab armies were already preparing for another onslaught against Israel, so the Americans agreed to help arm the Israelis by training their troops and arming them with modern machines of warfare. They trained Israeli Air Force pilots (who became the best fighter pilots in the sky), and prepared Israel to defend itself against the Arab armies who were being supplied with modern weapons and military training by Russia. This was the time period of the “Cold War” between the Soviet Union and the U.S.A.
The “Cold War” also helped to bond the USA and Israel because Israel became the place, halfway around the world, where the US could test their military weapons against Russia’s military might.
Not only did the Israelis prove themselves worthy of the task in beating back several other Arab attempts to invade Israel, Israel became the strongest military power in the Middle East…using U.S.A. training and weapons.
More than just the military gains, Israel became the “garden” of the desolate Middle East. Other than the oil pumped by Saudi Arabia, Israel developed an economy four times larger and stronger than the aggregate of all its Arab neighbors. They took the desolate Palestinian desert and made it “bloom”. They built cities and factories where only the Bedouin Arabs had trekked with their goats. Israel became an adopted child of the U.S.A. developing technical expertise rivaling that of the U.S. A. itself.
That’s why the USA now thinks of Israel in a preferential manner to that of all other nations in the world. Having reached adulthood, Israel and the United States have become “brothers” halfway around the world.
In this case, somebody did ask me…
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Interesting. I didn't know the reason and I bet a lot of people don't know it either. I think you cleared it up for many.
6/16/08 3:19 AM