Something to Think About

A Short Comment

By Tony Sayegh



Many years ago a theory was put forth by many Arab leaders for dealing with Israel. According to this theory, the Jews in Israel come from so many different countries, they come from different cultures, they do not speak the same language, you have the Ashkenazi Jews and the Sephardi Jews, and all of them have never lived together as a majority.

According to this theory, the only thing holding these Jews together is the external threat (by Arabs) against Israel. Those advocating this theory proposed to have peace with Israel as the way to defeat it. Once the external threat disappears, the Jews in Israel would be at each other's throat, they would leave Israel and that would be Israel's demise.

Fast forward to the present. The largest Arab country (Egypt) not only has a formal peace treaty with Israel, but it now considers Israel as an ally and the Palestinians as the enemy. Trade is flourishing between the two countries. The same goes for Jordan as well as the Palestinian Authority under Abbas.

Normalization with Israel and quiet trade with it is wide-spread among Arab countries. Since 1973, there has not been any wars between the Arab regimes and Israel. After these 42 years that theory had to prove itself. By now we should see Jews in Israel killing other Jews; bombing, burning, throat-cutting, etc. should be destroying Israel from within.

Well, it is clear that the shoe is on the other foot. When the Arabs stopped fighting Israel, they started fighting and killing each other. Look around the entire Middle East: in my lifetime I have not seen comparable death and destruction as I see daily now. Arabs killing Arabs; Muslims killing Muslims; Shia killing Sunnis, etc. All this while Israel is expanding and prospering!

Those claiming to belong to the "Resistance Axis" find Yemen, Iraq, Syria as the logical killing fields, to kill other Arabs and Muslims, while the border with Israel is the quietest it has been for years.

What does all of this say about us as Arabs and Muslims? What does it say about Jews?

I leave it to you to think about it and to come up with the answers.

If you disagree, post a comment.