The map of threats against Israel is crowded, and we are straining every muscle to thwart them. They loom in the south, the north, and the east. But one serious threat \u2013 perhaps the gravest in the long term \u2013 is being neglected: the very legitimacy of Israel\u2019s existence is under assault by voices in the free world.<\/p>\n
Israel has managed to survive as a villa in the regional jungle partly because it is seen as an overseas extension of the West. The villa\u2019s extensive system of ties with that world \u2013 on the cultural, economic, diplomatic, and, of course, security fronts \u2013 has served as Israel\u2019s safety net. But that critical network is now dramatically fraying. The demonization of Israel has become fashionable across Europe and among expanding segments of American public opinion. The villa is more isolated than ever, which is why the prime minister likens it to Sparta.<\/p>\n
Whatever the cause of this demonization \u2013 classic antisemitism on the right, progressive antisemitism on the left, the sting of the Qatari scorpion, Israeli government policies perceived as extremist, the spirals of venom on social media, and more \u2013 it must not be accepted as a decree of fate. There is a temptation to curl up into fatalism: \u201cthe whole world is against us,\u201d or \u201cEsau hates Jacob,\u201d and hope for the best.<\/p>\n
Another temptation is to focus on the half-full glass: the friends we still have, such as India, the evangelicals, and countries ruled by authoritarian regimes. But that would be an irresponsibility of the highest order. The consoling image of \u201ca people that dwells alone\u201d is a strategic danger to the future of the Zionist project.<\/p>\n
It has been reported that Israel is rushing to acquire new fighter squadrons from the United States, fearing that after two pro-Zionist presidents \u2013 Biden and Trump \u2013 there may emerge an isolationist president, or even one hostile to us. The free world was saved during World War II when the ideas of Franklin Roosevelt triumphed over those of Charles Lindbergh, an extreme isolationist and antisemite who sympathized with Hitler and considered running for president before backing down.<\/p>\n
We were spared the dystopia of a Lindbergh presidency that Philip Roth imagined in The Plot Against America. But who can guarantee that a future president will not be a Republican in the mold of Tucker Carlson, or a Democrat in the mold of Zohran Mamdani? Can we rely on Europe, where Islam is the rising force?<\/p>\n
We must mobilize the national resources we have accumulated to change the narrative that attacks the legitimacy of Zionism, and to drain the swamp of consciousness from which these wild shoots grow. We cannot be content with help from Jews overseas \u2013 like AIPAC \u2013 or with another Israeli \u201chasbara\u201d campaign. A paradigm shift is needed. That shift will come only when we internalize that the struggle for our existence is decided not only at our borders, but also in how the free world sees us. We invest more than 100 billion shekels a year in defending our borders, but spend only pennies, in national terms, on the battlefield of global consciousness. This neglect may have existential consequences.<\/p>\n
The battle is far from lost. What is needed is Ben-Gurionist leadership that grasps the depth of the challenge and tackles it professionally and decisively. Professionalism means pooling knowledge and expertise, developing a \u201cwar doctrine\u201d suited to the new reality, mapping the field, shaping a narrative, designing tools to disseminate it, building international partnerships, and more.<\/p>\n
Decisiveness requires understanding that change is required across the board. Alongside physical national security, entrusted to bodies that operate at home (the IDF and Shin Bet) and abroad (the Mossad), Israel must entrust the cognitive sphere \u2013 the national security of consciousness \u2013 to a new dedicated entity: a nonpartisan state body like the other security agencies, with generous long-term funding befitting the challenge, and under the direct responsibility of the Prime Minister\u2019s Office or the Ministry of Defense. This is not \u201cjust\u201d about foreign relations or the protection of Diaspora Jews. It is, emphatically, at the core of national security.<\/p>\n
The private sector, too, must be mobilized. Just as physical national security draws on Israel\u2019s defense-tech industry, the national security of consciousness could draw on the cyber industry, artificial intelligence, and the broader technological world, with all its new developments, where Israel, as is well known, is a global engine. Because this is a matter of \u201cinfluence,\u201d careful attention must be paid to how the responsibilities should be divided, making use of the relative advantages of the state on one hand and the private sector on the other.<\/p>\n
National security depends not only on victories in Bint Jbeil or Rafah, but also on the battlefields of consciousness in Washington, Berlin, and Paris.<\/p>\n
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