Arabs corrupt the American establishment more efficiently than Israelis influence it

Wealth buys influence. Thirty years of oil wealth have given Arabs wealth that challenges Jewish riches acquired over the centuries. Technological advances create much of the capital today. The Jews’ traditional role as bankers is considerably diminished, along with a lot of Jewish lobbying leverage. The Saudis alone of all Muslims hold about a trillion dollars in United States assets. They buy more U.S. made weapons than Israel. Israel must be blind not to see she is losing Jewish economic advantage and stupid not to reverse the trend by annexing the oil fields to Israel.

An Arab diaspora is occurring. Arabs have money, Western education, connections—and many of them are smart. Arabs make up important voting groups and have considerable political influence. As in Vietnam, an American defeat in Iraq may lead to an influx of Arab refugees. Arabs also occupy important posts in business and will eventually level the ground with Israelis in the competition for influence. Only Islam unites the Arabs, especially its aggressive fundamentalist strain. That is dangerous to Israel.

A Palestinian state would get a lot of United States aid and take Americans’ eyes off Israel, as happened in Egypt, now supported by many bureaucrats administering foreign aid and military assistance programs there.

Israeli lobbyists should not accept defeat but rather resist the trend as much as israel can. Quite often, temporary arrangements last a long time. Jews must lobby for making the Holocaust a mandatory course in American schools.[4] Besides offering positive reasons for supporting Israel (geopolitical interests, cultural affinity with Israel, loyalty to an ally), Israeli lobbyists must show the consequences of withdrawing American support from Israel. Without American conventional weaponry, Israel would use the nuclear deterrent, which tempts Arab states to generate nuclear programs with the likelihood that nuclear weapons will one day land in the hands of anti-American Islamic terrorists. If Israel lost American support, it would likely turn to Russia (as happened in 1948), France (as was the case until the 1960s)—and China. Whatever the choice, a country unfriendly if not hostile to the United States would influence the oil-producing Middle East (a magic word for gasoline addicts) and force concessions from America far in excess of what it now gives to Israel.

Israelis should promote American idealism to reject compromises with Muslim dictatorships—virtually every Islamic state—and emphasize the American mission of supporting liberty and democracy everywhere -- particularly in the Middle East -- and the ostensible immorality of isolationism. Israel should court the American left, which denounces accommodation of regimes that abuse human rights, and the American right, which sees Islam as the new object of containment. Jews in America should pressure the United States government to establish clearer foreign policy guidelines about international police actions to stop atrocities, about national self-determination and resettlement,[5] about zero tolerance of the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and about allies—who should not be abandoned while loyal and democratic like Israel. Published guidelines should be morally correct and exclude cooperation with oppressive Islamic regimes. Clear objectives would help Muslims understand American actions instead of resorting to conspiracy theories and would make coalitions unnecessary, keeping whatever little special relationship Israel enjoys undiluted. Now coalitions establish the moral legitimacy of American actions, quantity compensating for the lack of goals.

Israel and the United States share great historical affinity. Many settlers fled hostile Europe to the land of promise. They fought Britain for independence. They tried to avoid violence by buying land from the natives who eventually resisted the aliens, even though they benefited from the technology transfer and the land was big enough for all. People in both countries see themselves as a beacon on a hill with messianic ambitions. Both were players in the Cold War. Both are resented for being prosperous and powerful, yet restrained. They have a common enemy, radical fundamentalist Islam.

Israel should resist American isolationism. Supporting Israel, a country with shared values, differs from promoting American values by force in the Middle East. To democratize Afghanistan is senseless. Supporting Israel, an endangered ally, the only democracy in the Middle East, makes sense. Most people would not doubt the validity of United States intervention to save Christians from Muslim atrocities. Similarly, United States intervention to save the liberal Israeli state is justified. Two world wars have shown the impossibility of total isolation. Some allies are too close to cut loose, and some enemies too evil to tolerate. Pro-active measures, like supporting Israel militarily, are better than last-ditch reactions.

Closing the United States bases in Saudi Arabia would not show American respect for national sovereignty but rather American submission to Islamic fundamentalists who are offended if a non-Muslim steps onto the land of Hijaz.[6] The macho mentality suggests Israel a reciprocal refusal of Jerusalem to Muslims.

No Middle Eastern state other than Israel is loyal to America. American aid to Saudi Arabia has bought neither lower oil prices nor Saudi cooperation against Islamic terrorism nor Saudi opposition to the spread of anti-American Islamic fundamentalism. Economic and political concessions to Muslims, from acquiescence to oil rackets to support of atrocious regimes, cost Americans far more than support for Israel.

The Middle East supplies only about ten percent of the oil America consumes, and holding Saudi Arabia accountable causes no disruption of the supply at the nearest gasoline station. There are other sources; the Russians would replace the Arabs gladly. Indeed, buying oil from Russia is better than giving the loans it defaults upon. Breaking O.P.E.C. would lower monopolist prices. American producers benefit enormously from O.P.E.C. price-fixing.[7] The United States government gets royalty-in-kind payments from domestic oil producers unrelated to profits, and price rises drive profitability up. The same accounting system that let corporations fake profits in the 1990s boom lets them hide profits from taxation. Since America imports about half its oil, its domestic output only needs to double instead of unnecessary conservation. An alternative is to explore and promote other energy sources to eliminate dependence on the Middle East or O.P.E.C. altogether—which will require overcoming important vested interests of oil corporations relying on O.P.E.C. for price benchmark and lucrative service contracts. American corporation collaborated with Nazi Germany; now they cooperate with Islamist governments.

Honesty, perhaps cynical, is the best policy in surprisingly many cases: public cannot be fooled forever. Israel should explain that she is driven to cooperation with atrocious regimes because the American corrupt military-industrial complex excludes Israel from United States government procurement and from major export markets. Israel, whose internal market is very small, must export to sustain Israel's vital war industries. The American military overcharges taxpayers for military hardware.

U.S. economic assistance to Israel does Israel no good but rather promotes ineffective Israeli policies, from excessive military spending to permanent Israeli budget deficits. Israel should seek access to American military procurement through an American/Israeli defense free-trade agreement—which would also stanch the Israeli brain-drain.

A Likud government should change the way Israel packages her policies. There is little difference between Likud and Labor policies, but those Israeli governments present them differently. While Likud’s simple, clear-cut approach often provokes an outcry among Western liberals, Labor masks its to avoid offending public sensitivities. Likud builds more Jewish settlements in a time of crisis; Labor beefs up what is already there. Israel must take into account both Arabs and the West. Everyone knows the Israeli pill is bitter; sugarcoating demonstrates Israel's respectful concern for consumers.

America rewards its allies little but bribes its foes. Israel might stop demonstrating unconditional loyalty and flirt with France. Such Israeli move might elicit better terms from the United States, more aid and more political leeway for Israel. Israel could disobey America by attacking Israel's Arab neighbors or annexing the Palestinian territories and reclaim the center of attention which Israel lost to Iraq.

Israel could befriend the American Catholic minority by giving it control over some contested Christian sites in Israel. Rapprochement with American Catholics will improve Israel’s position in the Catholic countries of Europe and Latin America. The Israeli ties would not outrage the U.S. Protestant establishment which is only nominally religious, and Israel could offer Protestants biblical sites held by Muslims.

Israel should defend the perceived property rights of the Orthodox Church against other factions in return for its support of Israeli interests with the Russian government. The Armenian Church is perhaps Israel’s only other important ecclesiastical ally and influences Armenian-American voters. Israel should disregard property claims from politically unimportant Christian sects.

Many Americans are conservative Christian moralists; few people can expound morality other than in religious terms. American politicians of a particular stripe endlessly invoke Christian principles to support legislative positions. The secularization of the state, so urgent in Locke’s time, is no longer a problem. Rather, the loss of religion undermines moral axioms. Jews should lobby for more space for religion in public discourse. Children indoctrinated with Judeo-Christianity would be less tolerant to Islam.

The small-scale Arab-Israeli war allows the United States to manipulate the balance of power and arbitrate differences, a policy the United States decried a century ago in Europe but adopted in the Middle East. The Palestinian conflict presents no serious threat to Israel, and America props it up instead of ignoring it, but the war with Egypt destabilized the situation beyond America’s capacity to control events. The Islamic terrorist war of attrition in the Middle East benefits American strategic interest.

Imagine living on a mountain and depending on a village below for important supplies—like oil. Good if the villagers are accommodating, but likely they would overcharge, offer your competitors better terms, and generally not treat you as the hub of the universe. A natural solution is inciting the villagers to fight each other—not too much, so that they do not disrupt your traffic, but enough so they depend on your aid and protection in the worst-case scenario. This is the American Middle East policy in a nutshell: reasonable, cynical, and self-interested. Now that Caspian oil is available, cash-strapped Russia is willing to supply the West with all the oil it needs. In that scenario, the Arab village is less important.

Rising anti–American sentiment in Europe after the demise of the Soviet Union poses a dilemma for Israel: American support for Israel pushes the European Union toward the Arabs as the best way to oppose the United States in the Middle East. Even the best friend is not absolute, and Israel should regenerate Israel's European support base with active participation in European elections and political processes in general, as much as in America. Israel behaved so in France and other countries before late 1970s when Israel found increased American aid more profitable.[8] American leaders might welcome Israeli influence in Europe. Playing America against Europe for support requires a leader of Sadat’s caliber, whom Israel lacks.

Israel should pursue rapprochement with China. Near the ex-Soviet oil producing republics, China does not need the Arabs. China has problems with ethnic minorities and with nuclear proliferation in North Korea, India, and Pakistan. China needs Israeli technology and Israeli weapons. Israeli's trick is to overcome China’s historical isolationism. Increasing Chinese involvement in formerly Soviet Asia suggests that Israel could do that.