Yesterday, the Holy See signed a treaty granting official recognition to a putative Palestinian state ruled by Mahmoud Abbas. The American Interest comments:

[Recognition of Palestinian statehood] balances the Holy Father’s tough rhetoric against Islamists killing Christians with a step aimed at conciliating Muslim opinion. And the Pope also has to look after his flock: Palestinian Christians have long played an outsized role in Palestinian nationalism (as they have in other Arab nationalisms) as a way of winning acceptance in their community on a non-religious basis. . . . This gesture may, the Vatican feels, help protect a vulnerable part of the flock by bolstering the communal legitimacy of Palestinian Christians.

On the other hand, for all the tactical considerations, this marks a remarkable change in perceived moral superiority within a fairly short period of time—time during which Palestinian tactics have, if anything, become more brutal and flailing. Both the background of Pope Francis personally and the milieu of intellectual Europe in which many cardinals marinate now militate in favor of the Palestinian cause, whereas a generation ago the international left was broadly pro-Israel. This move, all told, though it will certainly annoy Israel, will likely not represent a huge change in the global status quo. It is, however, a sign of the times.

Yasir Arafat was often quoted as saying that his “strongest weapon is the womb of an Arab woman.” That is, he believed the high birthrates of both Palestinians and Arab Israelis ensured that Jews would eventually be a minority in the Land of Israel, at which point Arabs could call for a binational state and get an Arab one. Using similar logic, both Israelis and their self-styled sympathizers have made the case for territorial concessions to prevent such an eventuality. Yet, Yoram Ettinger argues, the statistics have year after year told a different story:

Contrary to the projections of the demographic establishment at the end of the 19th century and during the 1940s, Israel’s Jewish fertility rate is higher than those of all Muslim countries other than Iraq and the sub-Saharan Muslim countries. Based on the latest data, the Jewish fertility rate of 3.13 births per woman is higher than the 2.85 Arab rate (since 2016) and the 3.01 Arab-Muslim fertility rate (since 2020).

The Westernization of Arab demography is a product of ongoing urbanization and modernization, with an increase in the number of women enrolling in higher education and increased use of contraceptives. Far from facing a “demographic time bomb” in Judea and Samaria, the Jewish state enjoys a robust demographic tailwind, aided by immigration.

However, the demographic and policy-making establishment persists in echoing official Palestinian figures without auditing them, ignoring a 100-percent artificial inflation of those population numbers. This inflation is accomplished via the inclusion of overseas residents, double-counting Jerusalem Arabs and Israeli Arabs married to Arabs living in Judea and Samaria, an inflated birth rate, and deflated death rate.

The U.S. should derive much satisfaction from Israel’s demographic viability and therefore, Israel’s enhanced posture of deterrence, which is America’s top force- and dollar-multiplier in the Middle East and beyond.