By Barry Rubin
The first event in Glenn Beck’s series of events in support of Israel was an outstanding success, though walking through a minefield of sensitivities. Held in the historic Roman-build coliseum in Caesarea, the program mixed Christian and Jewish themes—stressing the commonality of world views and spiritual values.
Beck estimated that 60 percent of the audience was Israeli and Jewish, and many of them were Orthodox, a sign that this community, at least in Israel, isn’t afraid of allying with Evangelical Christians In addition, Beck organized viewing parties around the world, including in some Muslim-majority countries where even watching a pro-Israel event over computers would have to be done in secret.
Here’s my serious analysis of Beck’s views on the Middle East and why they are largely accurate.
And here’s a great first-hand report of the event by Yisrael Medad. And here’s another report with photos
What’s really impressive is that even left-wing Haaretz was impressed, and that’s about as close to a miracle as you’re going to get this week.
The call for support of Israel comes at a critical moment. In addition to the terrorist attack on the Egypt-Israel border and a foiled kidnapping attempt in Bersheva, more than 100 rockets struck Israel over the weekend. Three longer-range Grad missiles were shot down by Israel’s Iron Dome system which passed its first serious test in combat conditions.
At an emergency meeting of the Israeli parliament’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Shaul Mofaz, a retired general and the number-two leader of the center-left Kadima Party, called for Israel to hit Hamas hard in order to “topple their infrastructures and create a system of ties with Egypt in order to prevent terrorism coming from its border.”
The international crisis is overshadowing the social protest movement in Israel, another reminder that national defense spending inevitably trumps housing and other needs, a matter of guns over kosher butter. The build-up of forces and installations on Israel’s southern front is going to be costly.
Under ordinary conditions, Israel would be gearing up for at least a heavy round of airstrikes against Hamas military installations, rocket factories, and the like. But there’s a new factor in the equation and Hamas knows it.
Within Egypt the old anti-Israel hysteria is building again. An Egyptian who took down the flag from Israel’s embassy—located in an ordinary apartment building—has become a national hero. Speaking live on al-Jazira television, he said, “Millions of Arabs want to pull that flag….This is a message to Israel that we can send millions of martyrs for the good of our country,” he said. A mob burned the flag, chanting, “The path to Jerusalem leads through Cairo.”
One “liberal” activist remarked, “After the revolution people don’t believe there should be concessions to an apartheid regime and what he did was take action in reshaping the official stance.”
Remember the April 6 Youth Movement, the “moderate” “Facebook kids” who began the revolution to overthrow the Mubarak regime, saluted by President Barack Obama? As I pointed out months ago, it was easy to ascertain that this was a radical, left-oriented group allied with the Muslim Brotherhood though not a single mass media outlet—or apparently U.S. government agency—did the simple research required.
One of the Movement’s leaders remarked that the flag-burning was, “A new blow by the people to Israel and the United States and its failed diplomacy.”
Here is a video of the flag-burning. The sound isn’t clear but the best we can figure out the slogans include: “Go, go, and if you don’t understand, I mean, go,” referring to closing the Israeli embassy; “We vow to set fire to it,” meaning to burn up Israel like the flag; and “Down with Israel!” Some say that slogans heard include, “Stop selling them [Israel] gas!” and “Let’s burn them with gas!” Another demonstration featured a sign that says, “The ovens are ready.”
The problem is that despite so many examples in the past—from the Iranian revolution’s hostage-taking to suicide bombers and September 11—many in the West still don’t believe that Middle East revolutionaries—Islamist, leftist, and radical nationalist—believe it when they say they are going to destroy Israel. They are not merely interested in material gain, higher living standards, and democracy. And the brave minority that doesn’t go along with this world view gets trampled.
Have no doubt that even in the Egyptian military there are many officers who share this enthusiasm or even hysteria.
My view remains that the military junta will keep the country, which is also fighting local Islamist revolutionaries in Sinai, stable. But when elections happen—perhaps in November—and a new government takes office, the prospects for an Israel-Hamas war or even something wider or going to be very high in 2012.
Incidentally, here’s a useful guide to the “Arab Spring” so far, compiled by LebanonNow. It includes casualties, refugees created, and a summary of events.
Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center, editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal, and Middle East editor and featured columnist at PajamasMedia http://pajamasmedia.com/barryrubin/. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). GLORIA Center site is http://www.gloria-center.org.His articles published originally outside of PajamasMedia are at http://www.rubinreports.blogspot.com
Real war is brewing…
You described it in a way I had not thought of “hysteria”. But it fits.
There is only one solution.
A very large and symbolic loss to the islamists across the region.
Consider the fact that in the eyes of the islamists if they survive in any form it is considered victory.
So what is tiny, alone Israel to do?
The UN is meaningless… Small reprisal attacks seem worthless… Giving up land is stupid, with or without “agreements” with autocrats…
What should Israel do?
All of this while Iran marches on to nuclear weapons….
I see that some are advocating a hold mentality.. Letting the arab spring destroy what it does until we can see the dust settle…
From Libya to Syria, Iran to Lebanon all hell is breaking out…
Turkey is launching more attacks on the kurds and the world is silent.
Maybe the Kurds hold a missing element we have not been working…
The Kurds are occupied by Iran, Iran, Syria and Turkey.
If Kurdistan could be made possible and nationhood could be put on the plate maybe that would be the symbolic boot in the ass that is needed against the islamist tide that is rising..
But how?
Israel already has quiet close ties with Kurds. My suggestion? Israel start funneling LOTS of stinger missiles as well as assorted other weapons to the kurds.
In the Art of War it clearly states that winning in battle sometimes is not about a headon approach. Maybe it’s time to weaken the islamists by enhancing the Kurds ability to free themselves.
This certainly would weaken Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey not to mention hamas and hezbollah and the islamists running around the sinai)
Just a thought.
Beck is just fulfilling his Mormon missionary obligations in the Holy Land–he was a late in life convert himself.
It is interesting that the 2 key US politicians who are currently visiting the area
–Cantor and Lieberman-
both boycotted Glenn Becks Mormon missionary rally
Why is that?
No matter which group, institution, coalition, or junta takes charge of Egypt, they will face exactly the same problems, only worse, that brought down Hosni Mubarak.
That is, the soaring prices of food and the lack of jobs. Egypt has no solutions to these problems, not even inciting war with Israel, however attractive and effective that option may have been in the past. Egypt cannot even fight a war with Sudan over water, and should the Egyptian military decide to try to cross the Sinai with an army to confront Israel, well, I don’t think I need to describe the diplomatic and political pressure that Europe, the US, and the Arab Gulf states would bring to bear, and the almost certain IDF destruction of that army before it got twenty kilometers.
Egypt is going to be in turmoil for years, because like Libya and Syria, it simply cannot feed it’s huge and growing population, nor can it magically create jobs for it’s huge, young, and expanding population.
You talk about Egypt sending an army with hundreds of tanks and aircraft and artillery pieces into the Sinai like it is 1967 all over again. But it is not 1967, it is 2011 and there are other options for a radical Egyptian to pursue: what if a few hundred rockets and missiles were brought into Sinai slowly and stealthily by some “Al Qaeda linked group” that no one has ever heard of before and then fired onto the North Beach hotel strip in Eilat when it is packed with Jewish tourists? Based on the events of the last week I think that is is a much more likely outcome than the Egyptian army attempting to deploy in Sinai opposite the Israeli Negev again.
Israel has the means to destroy any and all Egyptian military threats hands down while at the same time protecting Israeli population centers.
No wars have ever been fought and won by missiles and planes, it always and will always take boots on the ground, and frankly Egypt has neither the missiles, the planes, the tanks, nor the boots on the ground to even think about confronting Israel militarily, Egyptian bombast and saber rattling notwithstanding.
And the Egyptian military and political echelons know this.
I have noticed that those who are most afraid of a secret missionary agenda are those who are least committed to Jewish observance in their own life, and most likely to confuse Torah with liberal political activism. Orthodox Jews are better able to confront, contradict and intelligently refute missionaries. There is reason to be wary of, say, interfaith prayer rallies, but that is not a reason to steer clear of all political alliance with evangelicals. Those who say that we must avoid them because of a secret agenda to convert Jews are more than willing to work with Christians or other gentiles who want to draw Jews away from Torah toward a secular assimilated lifestyle, which is no less a hidden agenda of proselytizing. That hidden agenda does not bother those who are already so assimilated that they don’t consider it to be a danger. Religious belief of any kind, though, makes them uneasy.
We need to do everything we can to protect our brothers and sisters against missionaries, especially those who camouflage their Christianity as Judaism. But that’s no reason to reject sincere help from those who offer it.
Funny that the secular activists who warn us about Beck and Hagee have no problem working the the mainstream liberal churches who have always been ambivalent at best about Israel.
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