Israel – No More the Victim

Playing the beleaguered vulnerable victim in the Middle East may not work much longer for Israel, as the amount of high-tech weapons in their possession continues to increase to the detriment of the American tax payer and other nations in the region.

Obama will increase security aid to Israel , transferring $205 million for the development of an anti-missile system. Aid to be sent from the US to Israel is to be increased for the next ten years, growing from $2.77 billion to $3 billion. There will also be an additional amount of $205 million for the development of the Iron Dome system.

The US is proud of its cooperation with Israel – its key Middle East ally – and of the missile defense system that is expected to protect the Jewish state from Palestinian rockets. US aid to Israel since 2007 stands at a whopping  $3 trillion per year which is entirely devoted to the purchase of US weapons, in an agreement that is valid until 2017. All this weaponry is considered necessary to protect Israel from largely home-made rockets fired from Gaza into Israel .

Wikileaks recently revealed a remark made by Amos Gilad months before the Palestinian parliamentary elections that brought a sweeping victory to Hamas. Gilad labeled the Election Day on January 21, 2006 as a "fateful day." These remarks were actually a prediction made by Gilad concerning the effect of the 2006 Palestinian elections.

Hamas’s landslide victory took Israel by surprise. Israel , however, did not want to appear as if it opposed the democratic process. At that time, Gilad was head of the political-military bureau in the Defense Ministry, and he is quoted as saying he was certain the elections would be free, but that they would not result in democracy, as Mahmoud Abbas had already announced he would never dismantle the infrastructure. The cable also mentioned that Gilad was not sure the Israeli government had paid enough attention to the implications of the elections and commented that Israel is doomed if Hamas becomes a real power.

Despite US aid pouring into Israel and the international community’s sympathetic ear to its woes, Israel remains a victim of its own fear. It fears Hamas, even though it was democratically elected into power, and it also fears the presence of the MB in neighboring Egypt , because its strength and influence is consistently on the side of social justice, equality and freedom.