Sideshow

The Palestinian situation is becoming more and more marginal! The focus in the Middle East must be on Iran, and its drive to develop nuclear weapons, on Syria, that is entering a civil war phase, and on Egypt, where the military and Muslim Brotherhood are trying to establish a modus vivendi.

Yet, Pres. Obama and the EU continue to insist that the Palestinian "peace process" is central to Middle East peace. What nonsense! But, Obama has committed the prestige of the US Presidency on the tiresome task of trying to force the two sides to make peace, or rather trying to force Israel to make concessions to appease the Palestinians. It won't work, dozens of years of trying show clearly that it won't work. But, they keep bashing away at it, like a ram hitting a dam.

Obama entered the presidency with a promise to get the US out of Iraq, and he has suceeded (just) in that, and he is committed to get the US out of Afghanistan. He cannot afford to enter the current election campaign with the possibility of getting the US into another war with Iran. He will ignore the crisis with the true enemy of the US, Iran, and its nuclear threat, and instead concentrate on the sideshow, the Palestinians. This is appeasement. He should go down in history as the Chamberlain of the 21st century.

Meanwhile the Palestinian situation becomes more byzantine, if that is an appropriate epithet. Hamas is splitting between the so-called "moderate" Hamas leader Haniyeh, who is the terrorist dictator of the Gaza Strip, and Khaled Mashaal, the Hamas international leader, who is trying to negotiate terms with Fatah and come in from the cold, from the Shia back to the Sunni mainstream, by making a deal with the Egyptian Moslem Brotherhood. What is more dangerous from the Israeli perspective? What is better, to be eaten by a lion or a crocodile? It makes little difference to Israel whether or not Hamas in Gaza is pro-Iranian or pro-MB. If they are pro-Iranian they will get arms from Iran and if they are pro-MB they will get arms thru Egypt. But, it does help Israel if its sworn enemy is split. Basically if they can't crack the Israeli nut, they will be forced to feed off each other. The Palestinians are so "f----ed up" that they are not a real threat to anybody, I can't understand why anybody bothers with the Pals anyway.

Watershed

There are certain points in history when everything changes, a watershed. But sometimes the origins of the change and the change itself cohere into a subtle segue. This is what has happened to the Jews. Two principal events triggered this change, the growth of Nazism and the Holocaust (1933-1945) and the growth of Zionism and the formation of the Jewish State (1918-1948). These two events, one negative the other positive have projected Jews into a different sphere.

Once upon a time the center of gravity of the Jews was eastern Europe, from Germany to Russia there were millions of Jews, living precarious and pious lives. When the Holocaust carried them away under terrible conditions, those Jews who were left were mainly in the West and in Israel. Not only do these Jews expect to be treated respectfully as citizens of democratic countries, but they also will no longer tolerate being treated as second or third class citizens. The first response of Jews to a threat was to pray and flee, now the first response is to fight, especially since Israel now has the largest concentration of Jews in the world and we have an excellent fighting force, the IDF. The British have the saying "praise the Lord, but pass the ammunition."

Having passed this watershed, we Jews have to realize that we are different from those Jews who came before. This is a difficult thing to do, especially since the lines of historical continuity and culture tend towards uniformity. We still think of ourselves as victims. But, we have become the new Jew, we must turn over a new leaf, we must be different from the past. We have seen the abyss and those of us who survived have taken an oath, a personal oath, not to behave as our forbears did, even if they had no choice, we will make these choices for ourselves. One example of this is the response to the threat of Iran. Here you have the leader of a large and powerful country threatening to destroy Israel and the Jews. And this is no idle threat, they are preparing themselves for a global campaign, much as the Nazis did using the might and riches of Germany. But, that time it took the whole world to defeat and conquer Germany. Now, it's David and Goliath, Israel is preparing to stand up to and destroy the capability of Iran to destroy us. That is the change, instead of being a powerless people in the face of a declared threat, we are taking the intiative in our own defence.

I predict that Iran will never give up the pursuit of nuclear weapons and missiles to deliver them whatever the sanctions. I predict that Israel will be forced to strike against the Iranian nuclear facilities and its infrastructure, and I predict that Israel will be successful. Iran will be set back at least ten years and during that time, if not imminently, there will be social chaos in Iran and a regime change. Such is the fundamental change that has occured within the psychology of the Jewish people.

Bombing attacks

The simultaneous bombing attacks on Israeli targets in New Delhi, India, and that which was foiled in Tblisi, Georgia, are evidence of a guiding hand behind the scenes. Luckily noone was killed and the evidence from Georgia might provide useful clues of who was behind it, but without proof one can only speculate. Since this was the fourth anniversary of the death by bombing of the Chief of the Hizbollah military mission in Syria, Ahmad Mugnieh, then it makes sense that these acts were carried out by Hizbollah. But, since the deaths of Iranian scientists were also caused by magnetic bombs attached to cars, which Iran blamed on Israel, one can speculate that Iran's hand is behind this. As PM Netanyahu said, Iran is the greatest exporter of terrorism in the world.

These attacks are part of a much larger campaign, a war in fact, being carried out against Israel and indeed the whole of western civilization, by the expansive and fundamentalist Islamist Shia State of Iran. When Ayatollah Khomeini came to power in 1979 as a result of the revolution in Iran, he proclaimed openly his intention of waging war against Israel and the US. Not only did they attack secular Iraq, but they took overthe US Embassy in Tehran and set up Hizbollah in Lebanon and started to support Hamas in Gaza. Their intenion is to ring Israel and then, usng their nuclear weapons and missiles, attack in force. One cannot doubt this given the number of times that PM Ahmedinejad and other leaders of the regime in Iran have pronounced their intention to "wipe Israel off the map." Jewish experience throughout the centuries and including the Holocaust during WWII have forewarned us to take the threats of powerful dictators very seriously.

If we acknowledge that we are in a declared war, then we will not make the same mistake that the US made in ignoring the declaration of war against it by Osama bin Ladin of al Qaeda. Because they ignored it and did not take the threat seriously they were totally unprepared for the attack that then came on 9/11. Ignore the threats of determined fanatics at your cost. Why is Iran carrying out naval operations in the Persian Gulf and threatening to close the Straits of Hormuz, why have they just announced that they have small, fast explosive suicide boats ready in the Gulf to attack the ships of any navy that threatens them (meaning the US)? You can judge for yourself.

The American people are not interested in another war. They have had enough with Iraq and Afghanistan, and they elected Pres. Obama to end these conflicts. But, when someone has declared war against you, it is foolish in the extreme to ignore it. What happens viv-a-vis Iran can affect the upcoming election campaign and Obama certainly does not want a war with Iran at the very least until after the election. But, often men cannot detemine events and the clock is ticking on a US-Iranian clash over hegemony in the Persian Gulf area. Whether it comes before or after Israel is forced to attack Iran to prevent its development of nuclear weapons remains to be seen.

Split in Hamas

What does it mean when Khaled Mashaal, the nominal Head of Hamas, decamps from Damascus to Qatar and makes a unity deal with PA Pres Abbas of Fatah there, and PM Haniyeh of Hamas in Gaza goes to Iran for the 33rd aniversary of the Khomeini revolution? It means that there is a split in Hamas.

Perhaps this was inevitable given the instability in the Arab world. Mashaal is anticipating that Pres. Assad will fall and he doesn't want a pro-Iranian Hamas to be left high and dry in an anti-Iranian Syria. In effect, he is turning his back on Shia Iran and voting for the Sunni version of Muslim militancy, the Muslim Brotherhood, that now stands on the brink of taking power in Egypt (as long as the Egyptian military are prepared to give up some of their power to the newly elected MB-dominated civilian government). But, Haniyeh, representing the entrenched Hamas power in Gaza, is not prepared to ditch their sponsor Shia Iran, that has been supplying them with arms and training by the Iranian National Guard. While the split has not yet become an open wound, it will be a miracle if Mashaal and Haniyeh can bridge the gap between two such sworn Muslim enemies as the Sunni and Shia leaders.

Many do not realize that the Sunni and Shia, and the Arabs and the Beduin, hate each other as much or more than they hate the Israelis. Until now the Arab dictatorships (Nasser, Assad, Gaddafi, etc.) have used Israel as an external threat, much as Hitler used the Jews. Blaming the "other" for your problems is a standard technique used by dictators to take the people's minds off their internal problems. Now that the Arab peoples are experiencing an awaking, maybe they won't be so easily distracted. Israel is certainly not their main problem, apart from their economies and well-being, there is also the external threat of Iran for them to worry about. However, having tried to defeat Israel many times (you all know the familiar dates 1948, 1956, 1967, 1973, 1982...) the Arabs have found that Israel is too hard a nut to crack, as a consequence of which they have turned on themselves.

I would not say that this is the main cause for the current infighting in the Arab world, there are other long-term forces at work, but I would say that it is a major factor. The Arab world would be different if they had managed to defeat and destroy Israel. Now they are turning from Israel and engaging in internal strife. As long as Israel remains strong they will not be able to destroy us, and this will result in more severe internal splits. Now it seems there are three distinct Palestinian entities, the PA controlled by Fatah, Gaza controlled by the pro-Iranian Hamas, and the international pro-Sunni Hamas that is hovering somewhere between. Who can say what the eventual outcome of these splits will be. Those who claim to support the so-called Palestinians should decide which faction within the Palestinian mess they actually support.

Aid to Syria?

Israel is a Jewish country and Jews are known for their humanitarian instincts. Should Israel therefore set up a refugee camp on their border with Syria, just as Syria's other neighbors Turkey and Lebanon have done, in order to take in Syrian refugees? I am against such a policy. There are very good reasons why:
1. Syria of all Arab countries has been the most implacably opposed to Israel. Of all the countries where Israelis have been imprisoned, Syria treated them worse. Some were kept in cells the size of dog kennels and were forced to eat their own feces (I do not make this up). No wonder some of the Israeli prisoners exchanged in the 1960-70s were insane. Syria also has the most extreme indoctrination of all the Arab countries of hatred against all Israelis and Jews. When the other countries (Egypt, Jordan) came to terms with Israel after all the wars and signed peace treaties, Syria remained the head of the "rejectionist front." That is why until now Hamas and other extreme terrorist organizations have had their headquarters in Damascus.
2. Some people may have the mistaken impression that the opposition to the Assad regime are democrats. Far from it, they are mostly supporters of the Moslem Brotherhood, as in Egypt and N. Africa, and even though there are some true liberals and democrats among them, as in Egypt they represent a pitifully small percentage (ca. 1%). This is clearly shown by the rhetoric of the demonstrators and insurgents, for example among their favorite slogans are anti-Israel ones, including the signs that accuse Assad of being "soft on Israel." What, you might ask? But, from their pov this is clear, Bashar Assad has been in power for 14 years and not once has he attacked Israel directly. He like his father has preferred to use Lebanese proxies to attack Israel, his father used the PLO and other left-wing and nationalist groups, Bashar has used Hizbollah, the Shia militia supported by Iran. Just as the Egyptians accused Mubarak of being pro-American, because he accepted US aid, and pro-Israel, because he signed a peace treaty with Israel, so the Syrian insurgents accuse Assad of being pro-Israel. Its ludicrous, I know, but such is the twisted logic of the Arab mind.
3. Humanitarian aid can backfire. Those who give humanitarian aid expect the recipients, usually injured, usually fleeing from tanks and guns, to be grateful for the help. But, don't expect this from people who have been indoctrinated with hatred for Israel and Jews. I can think of two examples, a woman from Gaza who had been treated in an Israeli hospital was returning for treatment and was found to be wearing a suicide belt, with which she intended to kill the nurses and doctors there. I remember a case far back after the 6-day war when a wounded Syrian soldier's life was saved by the Israeli medics who amputated his legs to save his life. As he was being returned to Syria he was shouting anti-Israel slogans. This might have been for the Syrian media, after all since his life was saved by Israelis he might have been suspected of going soft on them. Among the refugees who might seek help in an Israeli medical facility there will certainly be those wearing suicide belts. Who would risk the lives of our people to help such scum.
4. Why not provide guns to the anti-Assad forces. Instead of giving suffering refugees, who hate us anyway, medical help, why not provide guns instead. However, this is not a practical tactic. For example, Israel gave armaments and training to the Christian forces (Phalangists) in Lebanon who were fighting against the Shia forces in the south. During the first Lebanon war in 1982, when Israel invaded Lebanon, the Christian forces were supposed to cooperate with the IDF. But the Phalangists double crossed the IDF and refused to cooperate. In other words once the IDF had done their job for them in the south they did not want to be seen as allies of the hated Jews. This is one reason why they went into theSabra and Shatila Palestinian refugee camps and carried out massacres, against IDF instructions. It is certain that no force in Syria would in any way actually align itself with Israel and cooperate with the IDF.

The best policy for Israel is to do nothing in Syria, let them fight it out and don't intervene. If the West or the USA want to drop humanitarian food parcels or even guns to the opposition (Free Syrian Army) forces, so be it. But, Israel should have no role whatsoever in that. Let the Syrians kill each other, and weaken their army so that they are not a threat to us, while we continue to live a civilized life here in Israel.

Egyptian aid

In Egypt, 43 NGO activists are to be tried on charges that they conspired against the Government. Which Government you ask? Well, probably the military Government. They are almost all "democracy activists" and most of them are foreigners, including 19 Americans. Most have already left Egypt, but 5 Americans are still there and in custody, including Sam LaHood, the son of the US Transportation Secretary, Ray Lahood.

The Congress has warned Egypt that its aid of b$1.3 pa is at stake if they go ahead with this trial. Not only is it anti-democratic, but it makes a mockery of Pres. Obama's numerous attempts to placate the Arabs and especially the Egyptians, going back to his ludicrous speech from Cairo in 2009, which was entitled "a new beginning"!! Certainly much has changed since then, but so far, notwithstanding his goodwill and a great deal of US aid (b$40 in the past 30 years), nothing has diminished the anti-Americanism of most Egyptians. US taxpayer money has been thrown down the drain, Egypt is still corrupt, undemocratic and anti-American. Now they are putting foreigners on trial, which might be a popular move in Cairo, but will lose them most of their foreign currency support. But, they don't care.

If any American foreign policy expert is looking at the Middle East, if he is truthful he must admit that the Arab countries are undemocratic and unstable. Who knows what is going to happen in Egypt and certainly Syria is headed for civil war. Turkey, used to be pro-western, but its policies are very mixed, sometimes viruently anti-Israel and anti-American. You can't trust any of them. The only stable, democratic country in the whole region is Israel, and it has the best armed forces.

So what will happen if they put Sam Lahood and the others on trial and find him guilty and execute them? All the US can do is withdraw its funding. Big deal!

Roman conquest and dispersion

We attended an enlightening lecture at AACI given by Dr. Hank Citron, former Professor of History at US universities for 40 years who has an apartment in Netanya and shares his time between here and the US. His talk was on "Roman conquest and dispersion," namely how is it that the Jews survived the Roman conquest and are still with us, while many other cultures vanished after such conquests. He pointed out a stele in the British museum dated to 1290 bce that translates as "Israel is captured and its seed destroyed." Not quite!

He started with the conquest of the Incas in South America by Franciso Pissaro the Spanish conquistador. From 1532 Pissaro defeated the forces of the Inca Kings and subsequently laid waste to their land. He destroyed every city they occupied, except for Macchu Picchu that was hidden up in the high Andes. Millions of Indians were murdered and their culture never recovered. They were converted to Christianity and to speaking Spanish and their religion did not survive.

The Jews in Judea would not accept Roman practices, especially that the Roman Emperors were Gods. They revolted in 66 ce and the Emperor Vespasian took four Roman Legions to subjugate this stiff-necked people. His son Titus, who later became Emperor, completed the conquest of Jerusalem in 70 ce. They attacked the city, overcame its defences, and then set it on fire. They destroyed the Temple, the focus of the Jewish religion and culture, and then forbade the practice of Judaism throughout the land and expelled all Jews from Jerusalem. In so doing so they killed approximately 2 million Jews and forced another ca. 900,000 into slavery (according to Josephus in "The Jewish Wars"). The Arch of Titus, the oldest of only three surviving Roman triumphal arches, famously has reliefs on its walls depicting the removal of the Temple implements, including the huge gold menorah and silver trumpets, as spoils to Rome. Jews were not allowed to live in Jerusalem for 300 years! Yet, somehow the Jews survived the Romans whereas the Incas did not survive the Spanish onslaught.

Much credit for this must be given to Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai, who although alive was taken out of the Temple in a coffin. He then moved to Yavne, a small and obscure village by the sea, where he set up a secret academy (yeshiva) and where he and other scribes for the next several hundred years wrote down the oral laws and practices of the Jewish people. He was instrumental in making sure that Judaism and the Jewish people survived without the focus on the Temple in Jerusalem. Several hundred years later Jewish academies thrived in Gallilee, for example in Zippori, where Jews and Greek-speaking Romans lived side-by-side. Jews were dispersed to Europe and other areas by the Roman conquests, some as merchants others as slaves, and many moved to regions outside Roman influence, such as Persia and Babylonia (where the remnants lived until Saddam Hussein).

The only nation to survive intact from antiquity are the Jews. It was because the Jews had a literate culture and powerful beliefs as well as other factors that they managed to retain their continuity despite the hostility of the surrounding peoples. Only in our times, with the ingathering of the exiles and the establishment of the State of Israel has the process of the Roman conquest and dispersion been reversed.

Disband UNRWA

Last week Einat Wilf, Member of Knesset for the Independence Party (Ehud Barak's splinter group from the Labor Party) who has a PhD in political science from Cambridge University, addressed foreign diplomats in Jerusalem, and told them as reported in the Jerusalem Post, that "UNWRA is a major obstacle to peace." I agree with her, and this is the letter that I wrote that was published in the J. Post Letters section on Feb 7, 2012.

Sir:
I strongly agree with MK Einat Wilf's contention that "UNRWA is a major obstacle to peace" (Feb 2). In fact UNRWA perpetuates the conflict between Israel and the Arabs by keeping large numbers of Palestinians in camps in perpetual dependency on the international community.

Under international law a refugee is defined as someone who leaves their country either voluntarily of by force, but it does NOT include their descendents. If this definition of refugees was accepted, then there would be only a few thousand genuine refugees left after 64 years since the Israeli War of Independence and not the outrageous exaggeration of millions as the Arabs claim. With this small number of genuine refugees the whole problem would be much easier to solve. Even though there is no "right of return" for refugees, allowing just these remaining legal refugees to return to Israel would be a humanitarian gesture. But, if the Palestinians wait another 10 years to make a compromise agreement with Israel, then there will be no genuine Arab refugees left.

To resolve the conflict it would be better if in fact UNRWA were disbanded. Given the fact that this is unlikely to happen, then the US, that pays ca. 20% of the cost of UNRWA, and other Western countries should just stop wasting their contributions to UNRWA that only goes to exacerbate the conflict. Since money is fungible, funds given to UNRWA allow many Palestinian men to become terrorists at the expense of American and other taxpayers. Stop the payments to UNRWA and hasten a peaceful resolution of the Israel-Arab conflict.
Jack Cohen
Netanya

Human rights for Syrians

Where are the protests, where are the "human rights activists", where are the slogans "Stop killing Arabs"? Nowhere to be seen. It could be the cold weather, but we know it's not, we know that the so-called "human rights activists" only come out if Israel is involved. They are not motivated when thousands of Syrian Arabs are being killed in the streets, even though the degree of state-sponsored murder is much bigger than they usually protest. After all, they usually come out only when the IDF accidentally kills one or two Palestinian civilians. That's what really gets them riled up, Palestinian lives are more valuable to them than Syrian lives, even though these people speak the same language, are all Muslims and to all intents and purposes are identical. In all likelihood most of these so-called "human rights activists" agree wth Russia and China that Assad should be left to kill his own people and he is continuing to do just that.

In fact, Pres. Assad's regime in Syria has killed approximately as many people in the past 10 months as Israel has killed Palestinians in the whole of the Israel-Palestine conflict. It is estimated by the UN that ca. 6,500 Syrians have been killed, but this does not include those arrested and tortured by the regime, up to 25,000, most of whom have disappeared. Since the 1948 Israeli War of Independence, it is estimated that 8,000 Palestinians have been killed in 64 years, the majority of them soldiers (terrorists) wearing civilian clothes. On the Israeli side the figures are very comparable, perhaps 6,000 killed, including those IDF soldiers killed by the Egyptian Army on the Suez Canal in the Yom Kippur War 1973. At no time has there been mass casualties caused by Israeli military actions, compared to the mass killings now occuring in Syria. Even the killings in Libya and Egypt are on a far larger scale than happens to the Palestinians even when they inflict hundreds of deaths of Israeli civilians thru terrorism. Another Arab regime, like Syria, would probably send in its army and decimate their towns and villages, but Israel does not do that. Even in the most recent clash, Operation Cast Lead in Dec 2008 in Gaza, there were only ca. 1,200 Palestinian casualties, about two thirds of them being combatants (usually not in uniform). Pres. Assad in Syria gets rid of that number in about a week.

Most Western countries have a policy not to negotiate with terrorists. So does Israel. Hamas, the Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood, is registered as a terrorist group by the UN, EU, US and Israel. In the past it has killed hundreds of Israeli civilians in terrorist attacks, and continually shoots rockets from Gaza into Israel (sometimes using proxies like Islamic Jihad). Understandably, the Israeli Government refuses to have talks with this organization that is dedicated to "wipe Israel off the map," as their sponsor the Iranian PM Ahmedinejad says, and they also refuse to talk to Israel. In Qatar, the Head of Hamas, Khaled Mashaal, and the Head of Fatah, Pres. Abbas of the PA, the largest faction in the PLO, are having unity talks. They are trying to implement the unity agreement that was arrived at in negotiations in Egypt last year. So far nothing concrete has come from that supposed agreement. This time it is expected that they will come closer, because there is pressure on Hamas to compromise with Fatah because of the current unrest in the Arab world and the threat of Iran. But, if they do form a unity government then Israel will refuse to negotiate with them, because one does not negotiate with terrorists! PM Netanyahu was quite forthright, he advised Abbas, "either negotiate with Hamas or negotiate with us, you can't have it both ways!"

UN resolution on Syria

While the fighting in Syria continues to get more bloody, with hundreds killed each day in Homs alone, the Russians and Chinese vetoed the UN Security Council resolution on Syria. The US representative to the UN, Ambassador Susan Rice, said the US was "disgusted" by this veto. What the Russians and Chinese objected to most in this resolution is that it called for Pres. Bashar Assad to leave office. The Western allies would not themselves have called for this is the Arab League itself had not done so and asked them to support his removal in the SC resolution. The West's contention is that Assad has lost all credible legitimacy after his forces have killed so many civilians, now numbered at ca. 6,000 deaths in 10 months, with thousands injured, arrested and/or missing.

The Russians and Chinese in their vote show the lack of concern for the deaths of civilians characteristic of Russian and Chinese policies, even though Russia is no longer Communist. But, old habits die hard. At least in the Russian case they are trying to protect their assets, since Russia's only Mediterranean port is in Latakia, Syria. They know that if Assad falls then they are likely to lose this and any other contracts for arms that they had with the Assad regime. In fact Russia is still delivering arms to Syria while the uprising is ongoing. In China's case, their support for Assad is more difficult to understand, but they are motivated by an anti-Western, pro-incumbent policy. They are afraid that the removal of dictators sets a bad precedent, and their own people might get the same idea and they do not want unrest at home. So they will support any bloody dictator over any popular uprising.

As far as Israel is concerned, it is not our resposibility to take any position on Syria. Only that since Syria under Assad is an ally of Iran, it would be better for Israel, the region and the world if the Assad regime falls. However, what eventually happens in Syria will probably not be to our liking anyway. As for now they are removed from the immediate concern of what happens if Israel should need to attack Iran to destroy its nuclear facilities.

Natural selection again

One of my astute readers pointed out that natural selection, that I featured in a recent posting, may have contributed to the brain power of the persecuted Jews?

It is well known that Jews have received about 16% of all Nobel Prizes, while being only 14 million people or 0.02% of the world's population. If we compare the results for Jews and Arabs the ratio is even more astounding, there are ca. 325 million Arabs, or ca. 5% of the world's population who have won less than 1% of the Nobel Prizes. That means that a Jew has been 4,000 times more likely to win a Nobel Prize than an Arab! This is pure statistics and has nothing to do with prejudice or bias. One might ask why there is this tremendous divergence between the two cultures and the answer is obviously that Jews are...... (you fill in the gap). One might note that while Jewish children study hard and have a drive to succeed, Arab children are out in the streets demonstrating and throwing stones.

It has been established in the exchange of Palestinian prisoners for Gilad Schalit and previous prisoner exchanges, that one Jew is worth 1,000 Arabs, which is surprisingly close to the number arrived at by comparing Nobel Prizes. Now although there are only 6 million Jews in Israel, if that ratio is taken as reasonable then that means that we Israelis are equivalent to 6,000,000,000 or 6 billion Arabs. No wonder we do better than them!

It is topical to argue that Israel being such a small country cannot attack Iran, that is more than 10 times bigger in population andf it has had time to bury its ncuelar facilities. But, one should remember what a few thousand determined men can do a great deal, as the example of Thermopylae shows, when a handful of Spartans held back the Persian hordes.Never under-estimate teh IDF. When Iran and the Arabs consider their position relative to Israel they should take into account the factor of 1,000 that magnifies Israeli capability.