Arthur Herman, writing recently on OpinionJournal, says that Winston Churchill understood that the Jews are the bedrock of Western tradition.

A student of history, Churchill came to feel that Judaism was the bedrock of traditional Western moral and political principles-and Churchill was of a generation that preferred to talk about principles instead of “values.” For Europeans to turn against the Jew, he argued, was for them to strike at their own roots and reject an essential part of their civilization-”that corporate strength, that personal and special driving power” that Jews had brought for hundreds of years to Europe’s arts, sciences and institutions.

To deny Jews a national homeland was therefore an act of ingratitude. Churchill became a keen backer of the Balfour Declaration of 1917, which broached the idea of creating a Jewish homeland in Palestine. As a friend to Zionist leader Chaim Weizman, and as colonial secretary after World War I, Churchill made establishing such a homeland a matter of urgency. “The hope of your race for so many centuries will be gradually realized here,” Churchill told a Jewish audience in Jerusalem during his visit in March 1921, “not only for your own good, but for the good of all the world.”

That Churchill was a key figure in the establishment of modern Israel in 1948 can’t be denied, but Mr. Herman’s hagiographic essay is somewhat lopsided in its portrayal of Churchill as a supporter of the Jews and Israel from purely altruistic motives. Winston was, first and foremost, a man of the British Empire, and the interests of the Empire trumped eveything else for him.

As a reader points out on the response page, Mr. Churchill was not always so gracious about Jews. There are many examples but the first letter cites a recent lost Churchillian piece on the subject of discrimination.

More to the point, Herman apparently authored a volume called, “Gandhi and Churchill,” so I am very surprised that the blatant geopolitical rationale of the Jewish State is not mentioned. When the Empire took over the Presidencies and Territories from the East India Company in 1858 (can you imagine-India was the source of corporate ‘outsourcing’ since the subcontinent was a private corportation), the first project was to reduce communication and transportation times between Home and There.

In 1869, the first step was taken in Suez. But, the region was so unstable and so anti-Western that the Empire had to take further steps to bring order to the poor benighted masses laboring under local despots and thugs (a wonderful term named after an interesting cult group in Northern India that did not appreciate the incursion of the white man into Bharata). Mind you that the area had been a political football throughout the 19th century what with Crimea, the Iranian expedition, and various other actions requiring various fleets, admirals, generals, and gallants against the Turk and what not. WWI brought the program to a head. General Allenby, among others, criss-crossed the region slicing up the Ottoman armies and local resistance.

The ultimate goal of the empire was to put in place a new polity in the area to stabilize the region with Western Oriented Gentlemen who knew which end was up and were beholden to the Age of Reason and Enlightenment. Since Churchill was against slicing up the Empire, any love he may have had for the Jewish Nation would be more for their deportment to Palestine than anything else. San Remo and Balfour conventions, at the fall of the Ottoman Empire, were as much about planting a European (read: British) center of capitalism (those Jews and money) than anything else.

From my days in International Studies at the University of Washington, the received wisdom of the then dominant paradigm was that the opening up of a Jewish Homeland was along the same lines as fomenting the Muslim Hindu conflict or inter-caste/community conflicts-divide and rule. In fact, much of the current legacy of Israel/Palestine is from the Mandate-the British Administration. I am forever awed by how much Israeli legal bureaucratic structure resembles Modern Indian bureaucracy-The Raj. The buildings are the same, the “work to rule” is the same, and the incredible viscosity of getting anything done is the same.

No, from Herman’s examples I hear and can visualize the Conservatives and the Liberals debating a la Rhodes or Baden-Powell (the architects of colonialism and its bureaucracy) politely debating instituting the political importance of a new British colony, the Jewish Homeland, on the merits of 1000, 2000, or even 3000 years of history or the Abrahamic claim to the Cave of Makpalay in Hebron (bought for 400 pieces of silver and given to Isaac who gave it to Jacob/Israel). What a hoot! Winnie the Pooh only cared about Empire and history was its tool. Since when did the House of Commons pay attention to history other than to rewrite it?

About the images. Both were taken in Prague, 2005. I went with Susan who was on business to the annual meeting of the Claims Conference (the agency that has been fighting for reparations from the German and Austrian governments to material claims from WWII-yep, still going on). These pictures are taken on the edge of Jew Town. The first image is looking down the street into Jew Town. The dark building to the left is one of the oldest synagogues in Europe-the Maharal’s shul from the mid 13th century. On the right, in the foreground, there are a series of very nice building facades from about 1910, built during the economic spurt Prague experienced before WWI. These buildings were part of a world’s fair sort of deal, very swank, and have just been renovated during the post communist age. The one on the far right, is filled with couples from the different social classes of Prague-husbands and wives face each other silhouetted with their headgear/hairstyles, the coats of social station, and some sort of symbol of their class/station between them. Of course, at the top are the nobles, noblettes, and symbols of their station. A gorgeous building with delicate painted decorations restored with artistic grace and loving skill.

Prague: entering the Jewish section

The second picture shows the lowest floor above the doorway to the building. I looked all over for a reference to the Jews of Prague, who lived about 50 meters to the left. Susan spotted the frieze. Here is the Jewish couple with bent postures, hawk noses, and a pile of money between them. Yep, that’s how the Europeans saw the Jews in 1910. Either send them back home (Palestine) or find some other permenant solution.

Palestinian Media Watch reports,

Just a day after Israeli and Palestinian leaders at the Annapolis peace conference pledged to negotiate a peace treaty by the end of 2008, Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestinian Authority continues to paint a picture for its people of a world without Israel.

An information clip produced by the Palestinian Authority Central Bureau of Statistics and rebroadcast today on Abbas-controlled Palestinian television, shows a map in which Israel is painted in the colors of the Palestinian flag, symbolizing Israel turned into a Palestinian state.

The description of all of the state of Israel as “Palestine” is not coincidental, and is part of a formal, systematic educational approach throughout the Palestinian Authority. This uniform message of a world without Israel is repeated in school books, children’s programs, crossword puzzles, video clips, formal symbols, school and street names, etc. The picture painted for the Palestinian population, both verbally and visually, is of a world without Israel.

The fact that this campaign continues before the ink on the Annapolis agreement is even dry appears to contradict the central promise of the Palestinians at the Annapolis conference: that Israel has a right to exist.

You can view the video on PMW website.

How do Israelis feel about The Wall?

As opposed to what?

Susan and I have been looking at land in the community of Yonatan. It is a wonderful spot out in the Golan with light, wonderful air, excellent stars at night, and stalwart folks who work the land, albeit in the high tech mode of capitalist agriculture.

Moon Rise at Yonatan

The community is in the process of developing some prime view lots. Before they put in the power, water, and sewage, they put in the most important ingredient to Israeli life — the security fence.

The Security Fence at Yonatan

Looking around the lots, taking in the beauty of the evening, I commented to Efrat, the young woman showing us around, “It’s a pity about that fence.” “I agree,” she said, “but, our neighbors, the Syrians, have other ideas about us. What you call ‘crime’ in the States, our neighbors call ‘acts of resistance’.”

In Yonatan, it is the Syrians. In Ephrat in the Gush and Jerusalem, it is the Palestinians. In the Galil, it is Arab Israelis. Only the very largest cities and areas go without some sort of fence. Arab Israeli towns are built on the sides of very steep hills; utilizing the architectural style of feudal peasant towns clearly defensible from a frontal assault by marauding warlords and other terrorists. Jewish Israeli towns, however, are platted like suburbia throughout the US and Europe but with a controlled access gate across all entrances and a substantial fence (sometimes with a moat).

Front Gate

Although the actual number of times is small where a team of freedom fighters entered a Jewish Israeli settlement, murdered women and children in their homes before fleeing, most Jewish Israelis are not willing to take such chances.

Now in the States, the idea of “gated communities” is against the law—perhaps, when the US finally takes control of Israel, the rule of US Civil Rights will prevail. In Israel, it is important to remember what the enemies of the freedom fighters really look like.

Enemies of the Liberation Army

Back in the days of the Second Intifada (was there ever an end to it?), Jerusalem was the center of the War. There were regular bombings. School kids, shoppers, bus riders, and those who went out for pizza or drinks were targets. After the bombing of S’Barros in downtown Jerusalem …

S’Barros, Jerusalem