The Mirror
Israel is a nation whose foundations are shaking. Barely the size of New Jersey, it is surrounded by nations hostile to its existence. It was founded as the homeland for Jews, and, after the Holocaust and World War II, was given the “blessing” of the United Nations to exist in 1948.
It has been seventy years since the establishment of the state of Israel. There have been five wars with the surrounding neighbors, and a history of terrorism, rocket attacks, and unrest. In 1967 Israel expanded its territory and took over strategic refugee areas just beyond its border. Israel now has a total population of 8.5 million, with 1.6 million Palestinians living within the “old” borders. There are an additional five million Palestinians who live in the areas occupied in 1967.
Israel is a democracy based in religion. Judaism is given preference in the laws of the nation, and while a majority of Jews in Israel are “non-practicing,” the conservative religious parties have a strong say in what laws are made. They are proud of their Jewish heritage and want their country to remain a Jewish homeland.
But a democracy means that citizens have the right to vote and alter laws. With over 20% of their nation non-Jewish even without the occupied territories, the pressure is growing on Israel to address the concerns of all their citizens. Theocracy or Democracy is a growing question.
The current government of Israel is addressing the problem by building walls. While the occupied territories are still under Israeli control, they have their own elected governments. So Israel has walled them off, both the West Bank and Gaza. The Walls keep the Palestinians contained, and Israelis strictly control access into their country. Since most employment in the region is in Israeli territory, unemployment in the West Bank and Gaza is over 30%. These living conditions create a constant cause of protest and demonstration, leading to violence at the border crossings, particularly in the Gaza region.
If all of this sounds vaguely familiar to current Americans, it should. The Trump Administration has close ties to the Netanyahu government in Israel. Many of the tactics chosen by Netanyahu: building walls, restricting borders, meeting immigrants with legal resistance; all are similar to tactics the Trump Administration are using. Trump advisors have spoken of their great admiration for what Israel is willing to do, and have failed to speak out when hundreds were killed in violence at the Gaza border.
To the Trump Administration and its supporters, the problems of Israel are similar to the problems of the United States. They fear the “browning” of America, looking to projections that show that by 2045, whites in the US will no longer by the majority race. And like Israel, Trump demands that we build “the Wall” to protect us from the peoples to our South, “brown people.” They are not only trying to stop illegal immigration, but also cut back on legal immigration and even going so far as to revoke the earned US citizenship of immigrants.
Fox News commentator Laura Ingraham made this statement last week:
“The America we know and love doesn’t exist anymore. Massive demographic changes have been foisted on the American people, and they are changes that none of us ever voted for, and most of us don’t like … this is related to both illegal and legal immigration.”
Her racism is more than apparent, and her view is shared by many of the Trump Administration. This is the same “Breitbart” fueled fear that has driven the far right movements in the US for twenty years. Now they are in control of the reins of power, and they are trying to “foist” their white vision of America on all of us.
They are taking the Israeli model and trying to apply it the American problems. The problem is that it isn’t even working for Israel. While the walls and violence has separated Israelis from Palestinians, it has also place Israel in a constant state of war, costing them over 5% of the Gross Domestic Product annually (US spends 3.5%.) And it hasn’t stopped violence, rocket attacks, and terrorist bombings.
There are alternative strategies for both the US and Israel. There are more humane ways of resolving problems beyond just walling them off. And for both, change in the future is inevitable, no matter how high a wall they build. The inhumanity of their current tactics are obvious. Both nations should look in the mirror and see what their current strategies are doing, before they lose their souls.
