64 years of Israel: A non-Arab as enemy number one
By Soroor Ahmed, (NVONews.Com)
Only nine months separate between the birth of two theocratic states in the world. To much extent, they both owe their existence to the British imperialism.
On August 14, 1947 Pakistan came into being, after the partition of Indian sub-continent. According to Islamic calendar it was 27th of Ramazan, considered as a very significant day for Muslims.
Exactly nine months later, that is, on May 14, 1948 the Zionist state of Israel, was born. As per the Hebrew calendar it was 5th of Iyar.
While Pakistan was born in the name of Islam it never celebrates its independence day as per the Islamic calendar. On the other hand the Zionist state celebrates it as per the Hebrew calendar. So in that way this year it was celebrate on April 26. In 2011 it was celebrated on May 10 and in 2013 on April 16.
In Hebrew the Independence Day is called Yom Ha’atzmaut. It was on May 14, 1948 that then leader, David Ben-Gurion, who later became the first Prime Minister of the country, who declared the establishment of the State of Israel. The move came just eight hours before the end of the British Mandate of Palestine, which was due to end on 15 May 1948.
Sixty-four years later the biggest enemy of Israel is not any Arab country, with which it fought many wars from the day it came into existence, but Iran, with which it has absolutely no land or water dispute. The irony is that hardliners in both the countries do not want to see each other’s existence. What is more surprising is that till Feb 11, 1979, that is the day Islamic Revolution took place in Iran, it was the best friend of Israel in the Muslim world.
The Arabs and Israelis fought four declared and several undeclared wars, but there was never any threat of nuking each other. Today there remains a possibility––though many experts say remote–– of such disaster.
So far Pakistan is concerned its dispute with India is very much alive. It still claims Kashmir, whereas India says it is its integral part. But instead of India there is now more trouble on its western front, that is, Afghanistan. Once again there is no big land dispute between these two countries.
Both Israel and Pakistan remained close allies of the United States, obviously for entirely different reasons. But while, Israel neutralized all its enemies on its border, thanks to the open support it continued to get from the United States, and went on to become a powerful country, the situation in Pakistan is quite different.
Notwithstanding all these tall claims Israel is much more insecure now, then perhaps in the past. The non-state actors like Hezbollah and Hamas––both having the backing of Iran––are capable of posing much bigger challenge to it then the so-called powerful ‘enemies’ like Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and even PLO in their heydays.
Israel today is a divided society. The hardliners have, perhaps not realized the changing global situation. Those who advocate relatively soft option are aware of the changing reality in the region. With the United States yet to recover from the economic slump, Egypt no more ruled by a friendly dictator and Islamists in power in nearby Turkey––which was earlier close to Tel Aviv––the Zionist state can adopt hardline approach only at its own peril.
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