Mashiach Talk

28 Elul 5773

Setting aside all the distractions - like politics and personalities - there is no question whatever that this is "Mashiach talk."

Israel is not the Main Course

By Moshe Feiglin
24 Elul, 5773
August 17, '13

Israel has always suffered from inability to form an all-inclusive strategy. In the words of former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, “Israel doesn’t have a foreign policy; it has only internal policy.”

This inability to form a strategy is not due to some Jewish intelligence deficiency; it is because we have been evading the fundamental destiny of our national existence. We justify the existence of the State of Israel with pragmatic- not destiny-based reasons. Holocaust memorial museum Yad Vashem has become our holy temple. The Temple Mount, on the other hand, has become a source of primal fear for Israel’s leadership. It will do everything possible to be rid of it – and the sooner the better!

So despite the fact that we are the most advanced state in the region (the only one, actually) we are the only state in the region that has no regional interests. The only interest that we have is to survive. That is why we are capable of nothing more than reacting – we will never initiate: If the Syrians attack – we will attack them even harder. Until then, though, we will simply wait.

Strategy means formulating general policy to foster a goal that is beyond mere existence. ‘Tactics’ is a policy of actions and reactions.

In the Middle East, either you sit down to the dinner – or you are the main course. Western democratic countries can maintain static relations between them: In other words, “I do not desire what is yours and vice versa.” Israel would love to conduct its foreign policy in such a reality. But the Muslim culture in our region rules that out. Here the rule is: If you do not climb on me, I will climb on you.

Israel’s strategic objective should be to be a regional power in the Middle East. Due to the fact that we see ourselves as strangers and foreigners in our own Land (after both Rabin and Netanyahu shook hands with the Chairman of the Movement to Liberate the Land from the Jews, it seems as though the Land really does belong to the ‘Palestinian’ children) we show no interest in strategic objectives beyond basic survival.

The Middle East is crumbling, taking on its original, pre –World War I Sykes-Picot Agreement shape. It will fall into the greedy hands of Iran or Turkey. Everybody wants to be the new Salah-a-Din of the greater Arab Nation, which is shedding the national masks forced upon it by the West. Iran bids for hegemony by threatening Israel with nuclear annihilation. Turkey does the same by repeatedly humiliating Israel. 

In the meanwhile, the vacuum that has been created is sucking in the world’s superpowers. First, Russia and now, reluctantly, the US, which is taking advantage of the chemical massacre in Syria to attempt to rehabilitate its image.

Having a strategy means that if there is a massacre in Syria, it is Israel who must intervene and prevent it from happening again. What? Are we crazy? Are you saying that we should intervene for the Syrian nation and be the target of missiles in Tel Aviv?

Tragically, we are heading straight for a repeat of the US attack on Iraq’s Sadaam Hussein in 1991. If the US attacks Syria (for its own interests) it will be Israel that will pay a heavy price. In 1991, we had Iraq’s Scud missiles exploding in Ramat Gan and diplomatic pressure that led to the Madrid Conference, Oslo, the Expulsion and the serious deterioration in Israel’s existential legitimacy that we witness today. If there is a US attack on Syria, we will pay the same price for our passivity.

If we take the initiative, our first step should be to neutralize Syria’s missile capabilities. This would diminish potential harm to Israel and in the future, whoever would want to exert influence in the Middle East would understand that they must include Israel in the equation: not to demand that Israel pay a price, but to pay Israel its strategic due. In other words, in the Middle East, either you sit down to the dinner or you are the main course.

Currently, this idea does not have many supporters in Israel. Israelis feel like guests in their own land. They cannot yet absorb this line of thinking. For now, this is food for thought. Until I am elected to lead Israel, we can all relax in our sealed rooms on the Saudi dinner plate.

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"They cannot yet absorb this line of thinking. "

And that was precisely the problem Rabbi Kahane had and it is precisely the problem which prevents redemption coming TODAY! Get with the program people!!