After the recent earthquake, Israel sent the largest delegation of any nation to help locate, rescue, and care for survivors. Predictably, some of Israel’s enemies accused it of trying to distract from its imagined wrongdoings, or to polish its tarnished image, while a more hardened anti-Semite suggested that Israel was “heading to Nepal to learn from the earthquake how to kill better.” Haviv Rettig Gur responds:
Those who see propaganda in every piece of good news from Israel are missing the single most important fact you can know about Israel—that it isn’t a political campaign begging for your vote. It is a nation. . . . It doesn’t go away if it loses some imaginary popularity contest. And as with any human society, it offers an endless stream of failures and successes that will let you “prove” any narrative you want.
So go ahead and hate Israel. Or love it. It doesn’t really matter. The reality of Israel isn’t affected by whatever story might be playing out in your imagination.
Like so many of my fellow Israelis, I’m desperately proud of our countrymen who are saving lives today in Nepal. And also like them, I don’t give a damn what the global chattering classes think about it.
Read more on Times of Israel: http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/israel-doesnt-care-what-you-think/