In order to remain free, we, and the world, must pass the Israel Test.
The issues in the Middle East could hardly be simpler. On one side is tyranny, dependency, and resentment; on the other is liberty and its redemptive fruits.
The essence of liberty is self-government, of which political democracy is only one component. Governing others, whether through elections or through bureaucracies, is not the point. First and foremost, liberty means governance of the self.
A self-governing people does not whine. They do not expect to be catered to like children. Unlike the so-called “Palestinians” who depend entirely on funds from Western “charities” – billions annually from the U.S. through the UN – the Israelis give back far more than they take. They assume responsibility for their own fate and flourishing. Israelis don’t complain; they fight. The very essence of Zionism is that no Jew should ever again be a pet, dependent on the forbearance of some alien elite for survival.
A second trait of self-governing naturally follows the first. Free people produce more than they consume. Creative in the image of their creator, they thrive. Even in a world of ever-increasing abundance, fueled by new technology, arbitrary misery can strike, along with plagues and lean years, tempests and earthquakes. Yet even these disasters always seem most to befall regions where liberty and thus prosperity are scarce.
Liberty invites every man to contribute to the general prosperity by work oriented to the needs of others. Tyranny wastes a people’s energy, not merely through bureaucracy and interference from without, but by envy, resentment, and violence. Blaming others for one’s plight is a signal of subservience. If Gaza is a hellhole, the refusal of self-government is what made it so.
Envy is the sin of Cain and leads naturally to murder. The question put repeatedly to a free people, ultimately their Israel Test, is between envy and admiration of excellence. Do you view the exceptional accomplishments of others as examples to admire and emulate, and new sources of opportunity? Or do you greet these achievements with envy and hatred and charges of conspiracy, and demands for some unearned “fair share”?
The Israel Test gauges how a person or a nation responds to the merit of others who excel them in intellect and accomplishment. My book by that title – “The Israel Test: How Israel’s Genius Enriches and Challenges the World” – will be republished later this month with a new foreword by Dennis Prager and a new introduction by me. A nation’s reaction to Israel has become the most crucial test of a free people.
Equivocation by the United States toward Israel and its enemies, even to the extent of tolerating antisemitic violence at home, may be the most alarming signal yet of American decline in leadership for liberty.
Israel’s leadership is not merely moral but supremely practical. Not only has Israel emerged from five deadly wars over 50 years with a per capita income – for Jews and Arabs alike – higher than the per capita incomes of Germany, the U.K., South Korea, or Japan. The entire U.S. technology economy, comprising some 70% of global corporate market cap, is largely dependent on innovations and laboratories from Israel. Fully 100,000 Israeli citizens work in Silicon Valley and are indispensable to its inventive powers. Israel also is the key source of life-saving military technology for America and the free world.
Forty-plus years after Ronald Reagan launched the Strategic Defense Initiative, America still does not have a serious missile defense. The U.S. Patriot air defense system is more expensive and less effective than Israel’s system, which includes not only the Iron Dome but also the longer-range David’s Sling and Arrow systems. Arrow can and does take out ballistic missiles above the atmosphere. In still limited forms, Israel even today commands “Iron Beam,” a laser missile defense system that will zap missiles from the sky at the speed of light.
The U.S. Aegis system, now also with laser capabilities, is an astounding achievement. Alas, it is deployed in the lost cause of defending a carrier force made obsolete by satellites that can find the lumbering ships anywhere, exposing them to relentless attack.
The United States could not repeat at scale anything like Israel’s near-perfect repulse of the mass Iranian missile and drone attack in April. If, as seems increasingly likely, Iran goes to all-out war against Israel, it will be Israel, not the United States, that defeats our greatest enemy in the region. If the Iranian nuke program is terminated, it will be by Israel and not the United States. Israel is now fighting our wars and winning.
So, who is the leader of the Free World now?
George Gilder is the author numerous books, including Wealth and Poverty, The Israel Test, and Life After Capitalism. This article was first published HERE
The essence of liberty is self-government, of which political democracy is only one component. Governing others, whether through elections or through bureaucracies, is not the point. First and foremost, liberty means governance of the self.
A self-governing people does not whine. They do not expect to be catered to like children. Unlike the so-called “Palestinians” who depend entirely on funds from Western “charities” – billions annually from the U.S. through the UN – the Israelis give back far more than they take. They assume responsibility for their own fate and flourishing. Israelis don’t complain; they fight. The very essence of Zionism is that no Jew should ever again be a pet, dependent on the forbearance of some alien elite for survival.
A second trait of self-governing naturally follows the first. Free people produce more than they consume. Creative in the image of their creator, they thrive. Even in a world of ever-increasing abundance, fueled by new technology, arbitrary misery can strike, along with plagues and lean years, tempests and earthquakes. Yet even these disasters always seem most to befall regions where liberty and thus prosperity are scarce.
Liberty invites every man to contribute to the general prosperity by work oriented to the needs of others. Tyranny wastes a people’s energy, not merely through bureaucracy and interference from without, but by envy, resentment, and violence. Blaming others for one’s plight is a signal of subservience. If Gaza is a hellhole, the refusal of self-government is what made it so.
Envy is the sin of Cain and leads naturally to murder. The question put repeatedly to a free people, ultimately their Israel Test, is between envy and admiration of excellence. Do you view the exceptional accomplishments of others as examples to admire and emulate, and new sources of opportunity? Or do you greet these achievements with envy and hatred and charges of conspiracy, and demands for some unearned “fair share”?
The Israel Test gauges how a person or a nation responds to the merit of others who excel them in intellect and accomplishment. My book by that title – “The Israel Test: How Israel’s Genius Enriches and Challenges the World” – will be republished later this month with a new foreword by Dennis Prager and a new introduction by me. A nation’s reaction to Israel has become the most crucial test of a free people.
Equivocation by the United States toward Israel and its enemies, even to the extent of tolerating antisemitic violence at home, may be the most alarming signal yet of American decline in leadership for liberty.
Israel’s leadership is not merely moral but supremely practical. Not only has Israel emerged from five deadly wars over 50 years with a per capita income – for Jews and Arabs alike – higher than the per capita incomes of Germany, the U.K., South Korea, or Japan. The entire U.S. technology economy, comprising some 70% of global corporate market cap, is largely dependent on innovations and laboratories from Israel. Fully 100,000 Israeli citizens work in Silicon Valley and are indispensable to its inventive powers. Israel also is the key source of life-saving military technology for America and the free world.
Forty-plus years after Ronald Reagan launched the Strategic Defense Initiative, America still does not have a serious missile defense. The U.S. Patriot air defense system is more expensive and less effective than Israel’s system, which includes not only the Iron Dome but also the longer-range David’s Sling and Arrow systems. Arrow can and does take out ballistic missiles above the atmosphere. In still limited forms, Israel even today commands “Iron Beam,” a laser missile defense system that will zap missiles from the sky at the speed of light.
The U.S. Aegis system, now also with laser capabilities, is an astounding achievement. Alas, it is deployed in the lost cause of defending a carrier force made obsolete by satellites that can find the lumbering ships anywhere, exposing them to relentless attack.
The United States could not repeat at scale anything like Israel’s near-perfect repulse of the mass Iranian missile and drone attack in April. If, as seems increasingly likely, Iran goes to all-out war against Israel, it will be Israel, not the United States, that defeats our greatest enemy in the region. If the Iranian nuke program is terminated, it will be by Israel and not the United States. Israel is now fighting our wars and winning.
So, who is the leader of the Free World now?
George Gilder is the author numerous books, including Wealth and Poverty, The Israel Test, and Life After Capitalism. This article was first published HERE
13 comments:
"Blaming others for one’s plight is a signal of subservience."
While I may make further comments on this article later, my initial thought on reading it is that Jews/Israelis are the premier instance of a group who do nothing else than blame everyone else except themselves for their plight.
Despite George Gilders’ argument here, the thing about Israel is that it is the result of, more than anything else, an organised campaign of what can only be called parasitism on the resources of others.
In the first instance, Israel could never have been created without massive influxes of wealth from foreign nations extracted from the taxpayers of those nations via the efforts of the ubiquitous Israel Lobbies around the Western world.
Secondly, if the United States ceased its military, economic and diplomatic support for Israel (having reached quite obscene levels, again on account of the powerful Jewish lobby groups and wealthy single issue donors who dominate in US politics), Israel would be quickly finished.
To support my contention, the figures are freely available. For instance, I invite anyone to visit the Council on Foreign relations website where they can see for themselves the levels of (officially recognised) US aid that has gone to Israel at the expense of the US taxpayer.
From the website, we see that:
“Israel has been the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign aid since its founding, receiving about $310 billion (adjusted for inflation) in total economic and military assistance.”
“Israel has long been the leading recipient of U.S. foreign aid, including military support. That aid has come under heightened scrutiny amid Israel’s monthslong war to eliminate Hamas.”
“The United States was the first country to recognize the provisional government of the state of Israel upon its founding in 1948, and it has for many decades been a strong and steady supporter of the Jewish state. Israel has received hundreds of billions of dollars in U.S. foreign aid in the post–World War II era”
“The two countries do not have a mutual defense pact, as the United States has with allies such as Japan and fellow members of NATO. However, Israel is among a short list of “major non-NATO allies” and has privileged access to the most advanced U.S. military platforms and technologies.”
So, despite being ostensibly “America’s greatest ally,” not only does Israel rely completely on the kindness of strangers, it doesn’t even have any formal obligations to reciprocate in any way. Yet despite this one-way relationship, America is so influenced by Israel that it will go and fight Israel’s battles for it whenever Israel asks them to jump.
Mr Gilder is perhaps right, then, when he says that Israel is the “leader” in the relationship, despite Israel contributing almost none of its own resources to what it characterises as a “common” fight against [Israel’s] enemies.
And back to the original article briefly: “Do you view the exceptional accomplishments of others as examples to admire and emulate, and new sources of opportunity? Or do you greet these achievements with envy and hatred and charges of conspiracy, and demands for some unearned “fair share”?
What accomplishments [of Israel] is Mr Gilder actually talking about? How to leech off others and take all the credit for the fruits that fall into the arms of Israel, and call anyone who points out the reality an “envious” “hateful” “conspiracy” theorist?
Yes, of course i agree with you. I am totally astonished at the complete no-brains in the English-speaking world who run round in their keffiyehs chanting 'from the river to the sea" - most of them risibly ignorant of the entire situation, politically, but more fundamentally, philosophically. So ashamed of them. I have been proud to be an inheritor of the Enlightenment - but maybe we are seeing the end of that civilisation - only the Israelis between us and the darkness. Good on them - Come on the rest of us!!
Genocide, the internationally recognized crime of crimes, is not a policy issue. It is a moral issue. It is about the eradication of a people.
To confront evil — even if there is no chance of success — keeps alive our humanity and dignity. Any surrender to genocide condemns us as a nation and as a species. It plunges the global society one step closer to barbarity. It eviscerates the rule of law and mocks every fundamental value we claim to honor. It is in a category by itself. And to not, with every fiber of our being, combat genocide is to be complicit in what Hannah Arendt defines as “radical evil,” the evil where human beings, as human beings, are rendered superfluous.
What does it say about us if we accept a world where we arm and fund a nation that kills and wounds hundreds of innocents a day?
What does it say about us if we support an orchestrated famine and the poisoning of the water supply where the polio virus has been detected, meaning tens of thousands will get sick and many will die?
What does it say about us if we permit for 10 months the bombing of refugee camps, hospitals, villages and cities to wipe out families and force survivors to camp out in the open or find shelter in crude tents?
What does it say about us when we accept the murder of 16,456 children, although this is surely an undercount?
What does it say about us when we watch Israel escalate attacks on United Nations facilities, schools — including the Al-Tabaeen school in Gaza City, where over 100 Palestinians were killed while performing the Fajr, or dawn prayers — and other emergency shelters?
What does it say about us when we permit Israel to use Palestinians as human shields by forcing handcuffed civilians, including children and the elderly, to enter potentially booby-trapped tunnels and buildings in advance of Israeli troops, at times dressed in Israeli military uniforms?
What does it say about us when we support politicians and soldiers who defend the rape and torture of prisoners?
Winning, I don’t think so.
We ARE the bad Guys. Only a drop-kick zombie filled with hate would follow an inhumane pack of homicidal barbarian zealots .
Absolute rubbish!
AND - much of the wealth of the US is owed to the intelligence , the industry and the wisdom of the Jews.
Oh - you've been listening to the liars - more vfool you.
Plagiarists and con artist
Gilder, you bigoted clown. Do some meaningful research and reading.
Israel is an apartheid state that murders innocent people. And, as already pointed out in comments, if it was not for the hanky bunnies (who pander to the zionist like there is no tomorrow) Israel would not exist.
And, Israel should not exist.
Perhaps the terrorists should stop basing their munitions in schools and hospitals
As I understand it, not being an 'academic' or 'intellectual', 21% of Israel's population is Arabic. They have citizenship and fully participate in Israel society as Doctors, Lawyers, Street sweepers, whatever and don't plan on leaving any time soon. If Israel had not been forced to give up the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, perhaps the current Arab inhabitants of those territories would now be enjoying the Israeli life. Gaza had the opportunity to form a seperate state when Israel withdrew in 2005 but chose to follow HAMAS into oblivion.
Anonymous 12:34 is clearly ignorant on a number of fronts about how the world works, but seems to have a particular blindspot about genocide. Civilian casualties in Gaza are not genocide. Six million Jews murdered in WW2 is genocide. If you want a comprehensive list of real genocides, Wikipedia can oblige. The list even includes our own home-grown genocide when the Taranaki tribes murdered the Morioris. Gaza doesn't come close. Even the UN admits the numbers of deaths provided by HAMAS are unreliable and cannot be relied upon. HAMAS is also fighting a propaganda war and has nothing to lose by lying about the death toll. They never distinguish between combatants and civilian deaths. In their eyes there is no distinction. ALL Gazans are combatants because Islam makes it mandatory for all believers to fight in a jihad. A woman's job is simply to produce warriors. It's there for all to see in HAMAS' charter. The charter also declares HAMAS objective as being the destruction of Israel. The October 7 massacre demonstrates how they intend doing it, so the Jewish State now has 6 million reasons to eliminate HAMAS, since HAMAS has no compunction about repeating the Holocaust. If HAMAS chooses to sacrifice the Gazan people for their cause, that's entirely their decision, and apparently one acceptable to the people. Israel's action's are purely self-defense. And the "river to the sea" protesters are thereby confirmed as the ultimate useful idiots.
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