It's time for a bit of common sense. Some of you won't like it but that is what this blog is all about after all. Here's the unfortunate truth: The majority of people around the world hate Jews. Always have, probably always will. In demonizing Israel for doing the same thing any other nation would do - namely, defend its people against constant attack, the world has conveniently paved the way for Israel's Jewish residents to be massacred and to simply shrug and say, 'well they had it coming.'
Despite the obvious
video footage showing how Israeli commandos were savagely beaten with pipes and knives as they landed on board boats trying to break our blockade of an enemy that refuses to recognize out right to exist, and the proof that this was
an intentional provocation meant to demonize the world's lone Jewish state ('
Go back to Aushwitz'), the world continues to condemn Israel. Sweden is boycotting Israeli ships. The Pixies cancel a show (do any of these groups consider cancelling shows in the U.S. despite the never-ending drone attacks on Pakistani and Afghani civilians). The Turks threaten to cut off ties. Even supposed allies like the U.S. don't really get our back. The NY Times continues to morally equivocate, as always with Israel.
People like Leon Pinsker in Auto-Emancipation believed the reason anti-semitism existed was because Jews lacked a state of their own; Had we had a country, we would be welcomed into the world of nations. I think 62 years after the founding of the state, we can safely conclude Pinsker couldn't have been more wrong.
So what's a lone Jewish state living in a sea of hate, surrounded by an ocean of indifference, hypocracy and double-standards to do? Is there any place on earth Jews are actually allowed to live? Or by simply defending ourselves in our country, are we flagrant 'offenders' no matter what the provocation or threat to our existence?
We need to remain a thorn in the world's side, continuing to survive and even thrive here against all odds. We need to start playing hardball with enemies sworn to our destruction. No one wants a quarter million dead Palestinians but if they continue to provoke us, demonize us, question our right to exist, push us to the point of existential threat, they will push us far enough that that may be the end result. Same with Iran.
The irony is that the biggest moral blight against Israel - the settlements - seem increasingly logical in a world that doesn't really even accept our right to Jerusalem or Tel Aviv. Can we really trust Islamists to not shoot missiles by the dozens into Tel Aviv were we to pull back to borders that left us just a 10 mile buffer in most places? Better we can live in relative peace than we cede land to people bent on our destruction and neither us or them has any modicum of peace.
If there was any lesson from the Flotilla incident, it's that when you beat someone to within an inch of his life, and his friend is standing there with a gun, you're liable to get shot. So a warning to the world: Israel has always been an incredibly just, moral and sensitive country. But we're painted as the least moral of countries. Reserved for us is the kind of condemnation that mass murderers and brutal dictators don't even receive (see North Korea's sinking of a South Korean ship in international waters with no provocation only a few months ago as Exhibit 'A'). So continue pushing us up against the wall like the Israeli commandos aboard the Mavi Marmara, continue to make us feel we have no friend in the world, continue to hit us and deny our right to hit back. Let's see if when all's said and done, Israel doesn't turn into the demon we've been painted as for too long. Because our will to live is stronger than anyone's will for us to die. And like Samson in the temple of Philistines (Palestinians?), if we're pushed far enough, only then will the world understand the true meaning of Jewish vengeance.
