A Friend of Israel

With the government caving in to an activist judge, and putting Polar Bears on the endangered species list, and the California Supreme Court giving the green light on same sex marriage, I know it hasn't been a good week for some of you. But at least there is still Israel.

And our president was there helping America's best friend celebrate its sixtieth birthday, and he had something stupid to say, and then commented how Israel was “the redemption of an ancient promise.”

Ever since the time I grabbed the book Exodus off my father's book shelf, I have been a friend of Israel. I admit the steamy sex scenes were the initial attraction, the first little Becky had ever encountered in a novel—but I was also taken with the spirit of the whole cause.

Since then my friendship with Israel has never wavered , though I do not always agree with their government---I quite often don't buy stuff my own does. Nor do I like their lobbyists—there are few lobbyists I do.

But, I honestly think I am a better friend of Israel than George Bush is.

A big part of Bush's Israeli crush is his close association with guys like James Hagee and the Christian Zionists. They have a creepy vision of Armageddon and believe Israel will lead us into it. These nutcases want Israel armed to the teeth and encouraged to never give an inch. Eventually they know this will spark a world wide conflagration, with Israel fighting valiantly against the Islamic hoards led by Iran and the Ayatollahs, against a backdrop of nukes bursting in the air.

President Ahmadinejad has the same dream. He is convinced the mother of all battles will awaken the Twelfth Imam from his long snooze. After leaving his cave the Mahdi will usher in an Islamic paradise-- no doubt inhabited by an infinite number of thirteen year old girls, endowed with the mystical quality of perpetual virginity.

Hagee, Pat Robertson and the rest of them just know the conflict will beget the rapture, and the return of Jesus and establishment of his happy world, where there will be no concubines, but some of the faithful hope there will be lots of little boys.

Other than the name of the deity who will rule over the new Garden of Eden, the President of Iran and James Hagee agree on the fundamentals. One thing they are both quite sure of is that the Jewish swine will never partake of the the fruits of the land of milk and honey—they are going to hell.

For both the mullahs and these fundies, Israelis are just cannon fodder to be used to bring the new age into being. The only difference is Hagee is willing to give Israelis a good hearty slap on the back as he goads them into war.

The other aspect of Dubya's love affair are the fun tales that his neo-con pals beguile him with—it's all about how Israel is freedom's last outpost and the front line in the global struggle against tyranny. They have taken America's long standing attachment to Israel ,and converted it into some kind of wacky romantic Humphrey Bogart war movie—full of heroic resistance fighters, intrigue and selfless manly deeds.

But that is not how most Israelis see their country, nor what they want. The best gift the United States could give to our gallant friend is to do whatever we can to bring an end to the conflicts in the Middle East, which would bring a secure and thriving Israel into the community of nations.

Yeah—its not easy—but doing stuff like emboldening and increasing the power of Iran, as we have managed to do in Iraq, is not really something a friend should do.

And sometimes, when a friend wants to drive drunk, you take away their keys. We should have told Israel how bat ass crazy it was to exacerbate their problems by building more and more settlements in occupied territory. And we should remind them that just coming down harder and harder on the Palestinians is counterproductive to their interests.

We have become enablers of the worst instincts of Israeli politics.

Israel's survival depends on offering the Palestinians a more hopeful future. As long as Palestinians despair of ever having a decent life, Israel will be at war—and the Palestinians' best friend will be the Ahmadinejads and Osama bin Ladens of the world.

There may be a lot of crackpot irrationality behind the Islamic Curtain—after all a country the size of New Jersey should not be the center of anyone's foreign policy. But it is equally delusional to think that it can all be solved if we encourage Israel to stand strong in unyielding silence, ready for that inevitable day, when we will hook up with them, in a new crusade to liberate the Lands of Islam.

Good friends don't lie to their friends.