Garbanzo Toons

Israel at (3000 and) 60 - or so

It's late. I'm tired. I haven't had a blog post in weeks (thanks to Jungle Mom for checking up on me) even though I really have been trying to put one together. I saved some links figuring that since I haven't had time to write my own post, I could link to a few others' posts that I thought were important. I hope to finish and post it soon. In the meantime, I'm going to leave this short paragraph by Hoffer, and I'm going to make my lunch and go to bed. I would have done this an hour ago, but my daughter was on the computer finishing a project for school.

In the meantime, as it is the 60th anniversary of the reestablishment of the State of Israel, I'm going to run a short piece by my favorite philosopher, Eric Hoffer. It was emailed to me a couple of months ago and I've been saving it for just such an occasion.

Notice if you will, that Hoffer refers to "Arabs", not "Palestinians". Back then, the world hadn't been trained to accept the ancient race of people known as the Palestinians who had lived in the country of Palestine for thousands, or perhaps tens of thousands of years, who having left nothing to note their existence, are as mysterious as the extinct inhabitants of the continent of Atlantis. Perhaps they are the descendants of the Atlanteans. Nobody knows because the scholars who have convinced the world of the reality of this ancient and fabled race can offer no proof that they existed prior to the 1960s.

For people who are convinced of a government/Mossad conspiracy to bring down the twin towers though, this this lack of factual proof is unimportant. They will accept the myth (because the myth is more powerful than mere boring fact) of the Palestinians because to do otherwise would be Islamophobic . . . or something. One day an Islamic scholar will make up . . . um, I mean write the history of Palestinians and . . .

Sorry, I slipped off of my stated topic. Read Hoffer. I'm going to bed. I have to be up much too early.

ISRAEL'S PECULIAR POSITION
By Eric Hoffer, May 26, 1968

(In 1968 the LA times ran this article, written by Eric Hoffer, a former longshoreman and non-Jewish American social philosopher. Born in 1902, Hoffer died in 1983, after writing nine books and winning the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Although written 38 years ago, the following is as timely and applicable today as then )

The Jews are a peculiar people: things permitted to other nations are forbidden to the Jews. Other nations drive out thousands, even millions of people and there is no refugee problem. Russia did it, Poland and Czechoslovakia did it, Turkey threw out a million Greeks, and Algeria a million Frenchman. Indonesia threw out heaven knows how many Chinese - and no one says a word about refugees.

But in the case of Israel the displaced Arabs have become eternal refugees. Everyone insists that Israel must take back every single Arab.

Arnold Toynbee calls the displacement of the Arabs an atrocity greater than any committed by the Nazis. Other nations when victorious on the battlefield dictate peace terms. But when Israel is victorious it must sue for peace. Everyone expects the Jews to be the only real Christians in this world.

Other nations when they are defeated survive and recover but should Israel be defeated it would be destroyed. Had Nasser triumphed last June he would have wiped Israel off the map, and no one would have lifted a finger to save the Jews. No commitment to the Jews by any government, including our own, is worth the paper it is written on.

There is a cry of outrage all over the world when people die in Vietnam or when two Negroes are executed in Rhodesia. But when Hitler slaughtered Jews no one remonstrated with him. The Swedes, who are ready to break off diplomatic relations with America because of what we do in Vietnam, did not let out a peep when Hitler was slaughtering Jews. They sent Hitler choice iron ore, and ball bearings, and serviced his troop trains to Norway.

The Jews are alone in the world. If Israel survives, it will be solely because of Jewish efforts. And Jewish resources. Yet at this moment Israel is our only reliable and unconditional ally. We can rely more on Israel than Israel can rely on us. And one has only to imagine what would have happened last summer had the Arabs and their Russian backers won the war to realize how vital the survival of Israel is to America and the West in general.

I have a premonition that will not leave me; as it goes with Israel so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish the holocaust will be upon us.

Labels: Arabs, Eric Hoffer, Israel, Jews, Palestinians

posted by Harry @ 8:58 PM