Yes, Israel has been lucky, so far, that the Arab States have not copied S. Korea or Malaysia, economically. Now, I'm sure you think there are inherent, permanent reasons why the Arab States never will. The exact same reasons that, say, applied to Japan in 1870, or S. Korea in 1955, or China in 1980.
This lack of social/economic development by the Arab States, is what gave the Jews their window of opportunity to create Israel. But the window won't stay open forever. There are signs it's already closing. A Muslim nation has nuclear weapons. The Egyptian army did a lot better against Israel in 1973 than in 1948. Hezbollah has figured out a successful set of tactics for defeating Israel, and is steadily upgrading their rocket arsenal. Soon, what Hezbollah can do to Israel, will amount to a WMD, a realistic deterrent. Next, Hamas will do the same, to create no-go areas for the Israeli army, first in Gaza, then elsewhere, wherever Muslims are a majority of the local population. Ramallah, then Nazareth and E. Jerusalem.
Israel, to survive, needs to get ahead of this curve, and make a compromise peace before Hamas, using WMD, brings the Intifada to Nazereth. |
