Britannia Radio

DYING FOR (MINDLESS) PRINCIPLE
8.15.10

Israel is a democracy, but no amount of spin can mask the fact that a
democratic state cannot permanently rule over another people who are
denied the basic rights of citizenship.
-- Paul Gross, Jerusalem Post

"Israel's current way is not a formula for its survival and
Israelis ought to get themselves leaders that are dedicated
to the nation's survival rather than to being the most righteous
in the graveyard."

The above statement by Paul Gross sounds good, especially to liberal Jews who
typically demonstrate a shallow understanding of realities even as they embrace
mindless principles that end up in their own destruction.

The situation Israel faces conjures up to the mind a scene of lambs declaring
grand principles of love, tolerance, and brotherhood and then expecting jackals
to adhere to them. It is of course an impossible situation since the principles
the lambs advocate go against the reality of a jackal species that are by nature
fixated on the devouring of the lambs. But that lamb reality is the situation that
Paul Gross in the Jerusalem Post subscribes to.

There is even a historical situation in which a side died for principle:
the case of the Jewish warriors who rested on the Sabbath day against the
Roman soldiers and got themselves slaughtered. Surely we can do
better than that today.

The point here is that some of the so called "human rights principles,"
like the "self determination" that President Wilson declared, could very
well lead to the destruction of innocents when the principles are wielded
by aggressors who use it to accomplish their ends. As the world witnessed,
Hitler used these grand principles -- more sensible when put into operation
in a utopian world of love and brotherhood that exists only ideally or in
imagination -- to get control of the strategic territory of Czechoslovakia
and plunge the world into war. Those Wilsonian principles, as I heard
Menachem Begin explain, are principles that sound good but that in practical
terms are recipes for endless war and, in the case of Israel, her national
destruction.

Consider the situation of Israel, surrounded by Arab enemies who are
determined to destroy her since its existence goes against Islamic
religious principles that lands once controlled by Islam must forever
remain under Islamic control. This principle is a crowd pleaser both among
the Arab masses and Arab leaders. Add to the situation the about 20 to
30% of Israel's Arab citizens that subscribe to this view as do 100% of the
Arabs of the territories that Israel controls.

In these terms, these Arabs, both in and out of the green lines, are not a
minority but are part of a majority in the region of Arabs that demand Israel's
destruction. They are only a "minority" in the microcosm of the limited area
of Israel. In actuality, it is Israel that is a minority in the region, a minority
faced by the 150 million and more Arab majority that seeks its blood.
In these terms, the Arabs within the Israeli controlled perimeter are not a
minority but part of a majority, the vanguard of Arab efforts to return the
land of Israel to the control of the Islamic realm.

As we see, Paul Gross, on the basis of an unworkable principle, in effect,
advocates a decisive surrender of Israel to the Arab goal of removing
Israel from the region. The Arab population that Gross would accommodate in
a new Arab state would then take on their role more vigorously within the Arab
realm of pushing Israel back to non existence, all with Israel's help.

The fact is that some principles are not of such caliber that they must
override even more important principles: the right of a nation to preserve
itself against deadly, implacable enemies. Thus the so-called dilemma
Israel faces is not a dilemma at all were Israel's leaders not obsessed
with high sounding, unworkable, leftist ideological principles that, if
followed, are sure to lead to Israel's destruction as occurred to
Czechoslovakia in 1939.

I won't go into detail about this here, but the Allies after World War II
recognized the problem and took action to safeguard the future of Europe to
prevent such a thing that Hitler exploited and what the Arabs are today
exploiting. Israel ought to learn from the mindless disasters that have
occurred to well-meaning nations because they confused seemingly high
minded ideals with the possibilities under the realities of a world that
does not operate ideally -- a world in which ruthless aggressors exploit all
the weaknesses that poorly thought through principles to enable them to
conquer their victims.

No nation today is as dedicated to mindless and insane grand principles
than is Israel, which constantly makes the choice of taking the path that will
lead it to become what it thinks as the most righteous nation in the
graveyard rather than counter the evil intent of its adversaries by taking
the same action that Western nations took when faced with similar
circumstances. Israel's current way is not a formula for its survival and
Israelis ought to get themselves leaders that are dedicated to the nation's
survival rather than to being the most righteous in the graveyard.