THE WANDERER, JULY 27, 2006
JOSEPH SOBRAN'S
WASHINGTON WATCH
Remember Sarajevo!
Things certainly happen fast. Issues that were being
furiously debated only a few days ago -- the endless Iraq
war, the treatment of detainees at Guantanamo Bay,
containing Iran's nuclear program, dealing with North
Korean missile tests -- have suddenly been eclipsed by
the latest war in the Mideast. For a generation
journalists have formulaically referred to the region as
"the war-torn Mideast," and it's certainly living up to
the cliché.
As I write, the Bush administration is reportedly
giving the Israelis its approval for a week of military
strikes against Hezbollah in Lebanon, after which the
United States will join most of the world's governments
in calling for a ceasefire. And given the U.S. commitment
to Israel's defense, not to mention Congress's
subservience to the Israel lobby, this came as no
surprise to anyone.
But of course it raises an obvious question, which
has now become practical and urgent: How far does that
U.S. commitment go? Will America risk war, possibly even
nuclear war, to protect the Jewish state?
This is no longer an idle, academic, or theoretical
matter. Our politicians have set no limit whatsoever to
that commitment. Their rhetoric implies that it is total
and absolute. Few of them even acknowledge the obvious:
that there are differences between American and Israeli
interests, differences no American president since
Eisenhower and Kennedy, least of all George W. Bush, has
faced up to. Now we are paying the price for decades of
loose talk.
Some pundits are finally raising disturbing but
necessary issues. Richard Cohen of THE WASHINGTON POST,
for example, writes that the creation of Israel was "a
mistake ... an honest mistake, a well-intentioned
mistake, a mistake for which no one is culpable, but the
idea of creating a nation of European Jews in an area of
Arab Muslims (and some Christians) has produced a century
of warfare and terrorism of the sort we are seeing now."
He goes on: "It is why Israel is now fighting an
organization, Hezbollah, that did not exist 30 years ago
and why Hezbollah is being supported by a nation, Iran,
that was once a tacit ally of Israel's."
It's only fair to Israel to note that no other
state's right to exist at all is so relentlessly
challenged. Most are accepted by mere convention; some
were created by old colonial powers. If you go back far
enough, nearly all of them have rather dubious
credentials.
And unfortunately, the Bush administration seems to
take the problematic and reckless (indeed,
hyper-Wilsonian) view that only a democracy can be truly
legitimate -- and that only the United States, favoring a
"global democratic revolution," can decide what is truly
democratic. This is the real Bush doctrine and, as surely
as Marxism, it's a formula for endless war and revolution
(not to mention hypocrisy).
The next day, on the same page, two other liberal
columnists, David Ignatius and Harold Meyerson, writing
separate essays, both abandoned the usual analogies to
World War II and drew the more pertinent lessons of World
War I. The problem in 1914 was not that the great powers
refused to intervene; it was that they were all committed
to alliances that led to horrors none had foreseen. A
single assassination in Sarajevo caused all Europe to
explode; one death led to 17 million more.
A Great Miscalculation
All these points were well taken. Cohen's is one
that I have often argued myself. Could the original
Zionists have chosen a less congenial place on earth for
a Jewish state than the Muslim world?
We may certainly sympathize with the desire for a
homeland, a safe haven from persecution, as well as the
long-deferred dream of returning to the Holy Land, and
possibly even a separate state (though these are all
distinct matters), but what do these entail?
When the United States immediately recognized the
new Jewish state in 1948 (soon followed by the Soviet
Union), it seemed a simple business. European colonialism
was coming to an end, and new states were being carved
out of old territories around the world. Few outside the
Mideast foresaw that this new state might embroil the
great powers in new wars. The United Nations (at that
time the instrument of those powers) had approved it, and
that, it was assumed, was that. Two world wars had
finally brought a new world order, the possibility of
lasting peace.
In one of its great miscalculations, the modern West
dismissed the Islamic world as hopelessly backward and
destined to remain so for the foreseeable future. Hilaire
Belloc was a rare exception, a European who perceived
that a Muslim revival -- a violent and menacing one --
was a distinct possibility. Unlike his friend G.K.
Chesterton, Belloc also had deep misgivings about
Zionism.
Since 1948, of course, everything has changed. The
United States alliance with Israel has grown much
stronger. Not only have American politicians pandered to
Israel's "Amen Corner"; real affection between the two
countries has deepened, especially since the 1967
Arab-Israeli war. It is hardly an exaggeration now to
call Israel "the 51st state." Israeli politics, more than
those of any other foreign country, make front-page news
in America.
In addition, Israel has acquired nuclear weapons,
making it the Mideast's superpower. Inevitably, this has
caused the hostile Muslim states to covet those weapons,
either for deterrence or for the eventual purpose of
"wiping Israel off the map." A nuclear arms race in the
Mideast is another development nobody foresaw in 1948,
when the U.S. still held a nuclear monopoly. Even the
Soviets didn't get the Bomb until the following year.
The Present Problem
Zionism has even spawned an influential new ideology
in America: neoconservatism. The "neocons," despite their
meager numbers, have done much to promote American
intervention in the Mideast; the current Bush
administration (unlike the first one) has been guided by
them in its foreign policy. Their enthusiasm for war on
Iraq has done much to discredit them, but they are far
from finished. They argue indefatigably that -- though
they don't quite put it this way -- what's good for
Israel is good for America, even if it turns out to be
"World War IV."
Whether or not Israel was a good idea in the first
place, whether or not it has established its right to
exist, even whether or not that right derives from
Scripture (as more Protestants than Jews seem to
believe), the present problem is how the U.S. government
is to deal with the immediate crisis.
Let's hope Bush is mindful of Sarajevo.
+ + +
Get 'em while they're hot! REGIME CHANGE BEGINS AT
HOME -- a new selection of my Confessions of a
Reactionary Utopian -- is just off the presses. And we'll
send you a free copy if you subscribe to SOBRAN'S for one
year (at $44.95) or two ($85.00). Call 800-513-5053 to
order by credit card or check, or send payment to P.O.
Box 1383, Vienna, VA 22183. More details can be found
at the Subscription page of my website, www.sobran.com.
Already a subscriber? Consider a gift subscription
for a priest, friend, or relative.
--- Joseph Sobran
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Read this column on-line at
"http://www.sobran.com/wanderer/w2006/w060727.shtml".
This column copyright (c) 2006 by THE WANDERER, the
National Catholic Weekly founded in 1867,
www.thewandererpress.com. Reprinted with permission.
This column may not be published in print or Internet
publications without express permission of THE WANDERER.
You may forward it to interested individuals if you use
this entire page, including the following disclaimer:
"THE WANDERER is available by subscription. Write
subscription@thewandererpress.com for information.
Subscription price: $50 per year; $30 for six months.
Checks can be sent to The WANDERER, 201 Ohio Street,
Dept. JS, St. Paul, MN 55107.
"SOBRAN'S and Joe Sobran's syndicated columns are
available by e-mail subscription. For details and
samples, see http://www.sobran.com/e-mail.shtml, write
PR@griffnews.com, or call 800-513-5053."
This page copyright (c) 2006 by THE VERE COMPANY.