Israel’s Worst Enemy: Lies and Myths

by Bruce S. Thornton // FrontPage Magazine 

The Washington Post reports that some members of Secretary of State John Kerry’s senior staff think it’s time to say “enough” of Kerry’s futile and delusional attempts to broker peace between the Israelis and Arabs and implement the “two-

Templar1307 via Flickr
Templar1307 via Flickr

state solution.” That’s a revelation one would think the chief diplomat of the greatest power in history would have experienced decades ago. Since the failed 1993 Oslo Accords, it has been obvious to all except the duplicitous, the ignorant, and the Jew-hater that the Arabs do not want a “Palestinian state living in peace side-by-side with Israel,” something they could have had many times in the past. On the contrary, as they serially prove in word and deed, they want Israel destroyed.

As Caroline Glick documents in her new book The Israeli Solution, the “two-state solution” is a diplomatic chimera for the West, and a tactic for revanchist Arabs who cannot achieve their eliminationist aims by military means. But the “Palestinian state” is merely one of many myths, half-truths, and outright lies that befuddle Western diplomats and leaders, and put the security and possibly the existence of Israel at risk.

First there is the canard that Israel is somehow an illegitimate state, a neo-imperialist outpost that Westerners created to protect their economic and geopolitical interests. In this popular myth, invading Jewish colonists “stole” the land and ethnically cleansed the region of its true possessors, the indigenous “Palestinian people.” This crime was repeated after 1967 Six Day War, when Israel seized the “West Bank,” occupying it as a colonial power and subjecting its inhabitants to a brutally discriminatory regime. The continuing power of this lie Continue reading “Israel’s Worst Enemy: Lies and Myths”

Lessons of World War I

Much of what we think we know is false; what really happened matters desperately to us today.

by Victor Davis Hanson // National Review Online 

This summer will mark the 100th anniversary of the beginning of World War I, and we 800px-Royal_Irish_Rifles_ration_party_Somme_July_1916should reflect on the “lessons” we have been taught so often on how to avoid another such devastating conflict. Chief among them seems to be the canard that the Versailles Treaty of 1919 that officially ended the war caused a far worse one just 20 years later — usually in the sense of an unnecessary harshness accorded a defeated Imperial Germany.

But how true is that common argument of what John Maynard Keynes called a “Carthaginian peace”? Continue reading “Lessons of World War I”

Why Should We Study War?

Military history tells the story of human nature at its great heights and terrible lows.

by Bruce S. Thornton // Defining Ideas 

In the latter years of World War I, Winston Churchill met with the novelist and poet Siegfried Sassoon. Sassoon was a winner of the Military Cross––he single-handedly routed 60 Germans and captured a trench on the Hindenburg Line––and a fierce pacifist. Sassoon’s reminiscences of that meeting reveal how odd my title question would have struck most people before our time. He recalled that during their conversation, Churchill “gave me an emphatic vindication of militarism as an instrument of policy and stimulator of glorious individual achievements.” Continue reading “Why Should We Study War?”

More Rubble, Less Trouble

by Victor Davis Hanson

Defining Ideas

Western Warfare, as originated by the Greeks and systematized by the Romans, took various forms over the ensuing two millennia. European militaries put greater emphasis on decisive battles such as Gaugamela or Kursk. They focused on collective discipline, the importance of staying in rank, superior technology, and logistics. Continue reading “More Rubble, Less Trouble”

The EU Speeds for the Iceberg

by Bruce S. Thornton

FrontPage Magazine

The foreign minister of Spain recently compared the troubled EU to the Titanic, a metaphor not quite so trite given the new research into why the world’s biggest ocean liner collided with an iceberg. Continue reading “The EU Speeds for the Iceberg”

Why NATO Still Matters

by Victor Davis Hanson

Defining Ideas

Germany’s financial dominance may be worrisome, but is it a threat to European peace? Continue reading “Why NATO Still Matters”

Why Does America Defend the Weak and Small?

by Victor Davis Hanson

Tribune Media Services

Recently, an open mike caught French president Nicolas Sarkozy and American president Barack Obama jointly trashing Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Sarkozy scoffed, “I cannot stand him. He’s a liar.” Continue reading “Why Does America Defend the Weak and Small?”

The Pathology of Double Standards

by Bruce S. Thornton

FrontPage Magazine

The surreal moral idiocy that characterizes hatred of Israel is illustrated daily by states whose actions are shrugged away by the international media. Continue reading “The Pathology of Double Standards”

The End of the Euro?

Good riddance to a bad idea.

by Bruce S. Thornton

Defining Ideas

The champions of the European Union once touted it as a “bold new experiment in living” and “the best hope in an insecure age.” Continue reading “The End of the Euro?”

Post-9/11 -Isms and -Ologies: A Look Back at a Decade

by Victor Davis Hanson

PJ Media

The Never-ending Day

Like millions of Americans, I did not sleep much on the night of September 11. Continue reading “Post-9/11 -Isms and -Ologies: A Look Back at a Decade”