Anyone who cares about Israel wants to know if her Arab and Muslim neighbors will ever recognize the right of the Jewish state to exist—and whether or not there will come a time when Israel's people will be allowed to live in peace.
Given the news coming out of the Middle East in recent months, it is hard to be optimistic about the prospects for peace. The three volatile situations I describe below—which most Israeli leaders agree pose the greatest challenge and danger to Israel's future—will help you understand why I believe 2007 will be a watershed year for both Israel and America.
Iran is the greatest threat facing Israel and the world today. This Muslim fundamentalist state provides weapons and money to terrorists throughout the Middle East, including Hamas in the Palestinian territories, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and groups murdering civilians and attacking American soldiers in Iraq. The Iranian president has not backed away one inch from his hateful anti Israel, anti Western rhetoric, and continues his country's aggressive pursuit of nuclear weapons, in defiance of the international community.
In Lebanon, Hezbollah is struggling to attain more power, leading supporters in violent protests against the government and clashing with rival Sunni Muslims. United Nations' forces charged with enforcing the ceasefire that ended last summer's Hezbollah-Israel war have stood by as Hezbollah rearms and develops more lethal fighting capabilities.
While a Hezbollah takeover in Lebanon would be a disaster for Israel, and would almost certainly mean war on a large scale, maintaining the status quo is not a recipe for peace either: in a recent appeal for an end to sectarian strife in his country, the Lebanese Prime Minister reminded warring factions that they must save their energy for fighting "the real enemy"—meaning Israel.
Scores of Palestinians—including children and other innocent bystanders—have been killed, and hundreds more injured in Gaza during the past few months of bitter fighting between rivals Fatah and Hamas. The likelihood that a true Palestinian partner for peace will emerge from the bloody battle is slim to none. Several "ceasefires" between Fatah and Hamas have been broken, and fighting has begun to spread to the West Bank.
Meanwhile, rockets fired from Gaza by Palestinian terrorists continue to fall on Israeli cities such as Sderot, and suicide bombers—like the one that murdered 3 Israelis last week in the southern city of Eilat continue to enter Israel from the region.
There are few "good" options for addressing these threats. With none of her Arab and Muslim neighbors interested in making peace, Israel will be forced for the foreseeable future to maintain and even increase spending on defense, even though it is likely to come at the additional expense of social programs that benefit Israel's poor and needy.
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