(JNS) The phrase “Israel’s right to exist” should offend any morally serious person before the argument even begins.
Not because Israel is above criticism. Not because governments are sacred. Not because wars, leaders and policies are exempt from judgment. They are not. States can and should be criticized.
But that is not what this phrase does. It does not challenge a policy or condemn a military campaign. It drags the existence of the Jewish state itself into the dock, as though Jewish sovereignty were a claim awaiting approval from humankind.
Who asked? Who appointed the nations, the United Nations, the activist class, the editorial priesthood, the campus mobs and the self-anointed guardians of acceptable statehood to decide whether the Jews may continue existing as a nation in their own land?
The obscenity deepens when one notices that not even states that committed actual atrocities, even monstrous ones, are habitually treated this way. Not even states that engaged in real genocide—as opposed to the ginned-up genocide blood libel now blindly hurled at Israel—have ever found themselves in this docket.
Become a Member
-
Read all member content
Get exclusive in-depth reports from Israel.
-
Get exclusive in-depth reports from Israel
Connect with Israel, right from your home.
-
Lift up the voice of truth and hope
Support Jerusalem-based Zionist journalism.
Already a member? Login here.
