What Benjamin Netanyahu’s Strategic Vision Owes to David Ben-Gurion’s

The past several years have seen remarkable diplomatic achievements for the Jewish state: not only the Abraham Accords, but also, inter alia, close relations with Greece and Cyprus thanks to natural-gas exploration and the IDF’s inclusion in the U.S. military’s Central Command. Eitan Shamir explains how these recent developments grow out of a longstanding Israeli grand strategy set in motion by the country’s first prime minister:

David Ben-Gurion, aware of Israel’s isolation in the region, sought to [ensure] the country’s security by formulating basic tenets that would ultimately serve the country for decades. These included, among other things, a commitment to developing and maintaining Israel’s human qualitative and technological superiority while securing a strong alliance with a superpower. Ben-Gurion believed that through Israeli patience and perseverance, Arab resolve would gradually erode until the monolithic Arab wall facing Israel eventually crumbled.

During this early period, Israel tried to find ways to ease its diplomatic isolation. Ben-Gurion attempted to advance a “periphery alliance” between Israel and moderate pro-Western Muslim countries such as Turkey and Iran, as well as national minorities like the Kurds in Iraq. Israel offered its agricultural expertise to third-world countries in Africa and Asia in a further attempt to build diplomatic bridges. But in view of the confines of the cold war and the fact that Israel was a poor country with little to offer, these attempts came to little. Israel had to rely on its own military power; support from its main ally, France; and more modest support from other Western countries, such as the U.S. and Germany.

But all that has changed dramatically, and the results are precisely what Ben-Gurion hoped for:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu . . . has stated that “a country that exports things that are crucial for the surroundings or for other countries has far more power. . . . Alliances are made with the strong, and in the end peace is made with the strong.”

Israel should give credit to Ben-Gurion’s vision. At a time when Israel was isolated and boycotted, he asserted that Israel could survive if it focused its energy on developing its qualitative edge: science, technology, and above all, its human talent.

Read more at BESA Center

More about: Abraham Accords, Benjamin Netanyahu, David Ben-Gurion, Israeli grand strategy

Why South Africa Has Led the Legal War against Israel

South Africa filed suit with the International Court of Justice in December accusing Israel of genocide. More recently, it requested that the court order the Jewish state to allow humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip—something which, of course, Israel has been doing since the war began. Indeed, the country’s ruling party, the African National Congress (ANC) has had a long history of support for the Palestinian cause, but Orde Kittrie suggests that the current government, which is plagued by massive corruption, has more sinister motives for its fixation on accusing Israel of imagined crimes:

ANC-led South Africa has . . . repeatedly supported Hamas. In 2015 and 2018, the ANC and Hamas signed memoranda of understanding pledging cooperation against Israel. The Daily Maverick, a South African newspaper that previously won an international award for exposing ANC corruption, has reported claims that Iran “essentially paid the ANC to litigate against Israel in the ICJ.”

The ANC-led government says it is motivated by humanitarian principle. That’s contradicted by its support for Russia, and by [President Cyril] Ramaphosa’s warmly welcoming a visit in January by Mohamed Dagalo, the leader of the Sudanese-Arab Rapid Support Forces (RSF) militia. Ramaphosa’s smiling, hand-holding welcome of Dagalo occurred two months after the RSF’s systematic massacre of hundreds of non-Arab Sudanese refugees in Darfur.

While the ANC has looted its own country and aided America’s enemies, the U.S. is insulating the party from the consequences of its corruption and mismanagement.

In Kittrie’s view, it is “time for Congress and the Biden administration to start helping South Africa’s people hold Ramaphosa accountable.”

Read more at The Hill

More about: International Law, Iran, South Africa