TURKEY IS NOT THANKSGIVING

YEAST IN THE MIDDLE EAST

Ferment is being fomented in the Middle East. Yeast creates gasses that enlarge dough and, what is fermenting in the Middle East bodes ill for Israel. Turkey is leading the latest charge. It wasn’t enough to have a billion Arabs and Muslims in over twenty countries bent on destroying Israel, Turkey now sees its bright path in alignment with those forces. After all, where’s the market?

Turkey is edging away from the democracy introduced by Attaturk and rolling over to join the world of Islam. The Turkish citizens killed by Israeli forces on board a blockade-running vessel were unwisely attacking Israeli commandos. However unwise the Israeli attempt to halt the ship by boarding it, not knowing what awaited them, the attack by Turkish activists intent on killing the Israelis was equally unwise.

It is interesting to watch the world pile-up of condemnation of Israel for engaging in defensive measures for the safety of its citizenry. It seems unlikely that any sovereign state would act otherwise. The pile-up is more than moral outrage if one looks at the immorality of many of the accusers. To an older segment of the Israeli population it sounds remarkably similar to the screams of truncheon-bearing anti-Semites in myriad countries in the 1930s and ‘40s.

No doubt that Israel is in danger. No doubt that whatever is offered to the Palestinians in exchange for real peace will be insufficient in the eyes of the Arab world and thus of the Palestinians. Without the “Return” of refugees from the Arab initiated 1948 war, there will be no peace. Such a return would be the end of Israel. And if half the Palestinians agree to some sort of settlement, the terrorist groups in Gaza and Lebanon will see to it that it will not last. Israel’s mild response or major attacks will lead to the same result; it will be found guilty of over-protecting its people.

Perhaps a century from now, when and if the Arab world catches up to civilization, there may be hope for peace - unless Israel lies in shattered ruins on boundless and bare desert sands, like Ozymandias..