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Derbyshire's column on whether Israel has a future can be summed
up with (but not done justice by) the following statement: The state
of Israel was born of the world's guilt about the Holocaust —
itself a product of the inability of democracies to boldly defeat
its enemies; and the unwillingness of democracies to defend themselves
against its enemies will lead them to sacrifice Israel, and the
Jews, for expediency's sake once more.
I add "and
the Jews" because there is no doubt in my mind that a world
that would sacrifice Israel to the forces of fundamentalist Islam,
and to those who hate modernization with a religious zeal, wouldn't
have much use for Jews either. (Jews have always been a modernizing
influence wherever they have gone. They have historically been accused
of being "cosmopolitans" — which in today's parlance
means being a globalist.) A world that does not destroy these forces,
but instead seeks to appease them with airtime and international
forums and apologies, will also destroy itself. In short, if the
long-term prospects for Israel aren't good, those of the rest of
civilization aren't much better.
Like Derbyshire,
I agree that central to Israel's long-term survival is the fact
that "…intellectual, litigational, over-educated elites
who run modern democracies are much more interested in hearing a
case argued than in organizing the grueling, deadly, morally ambiguous
work of counter terrorism." Perhaps it's because democracies
and markets are largely self-correcting that so much of their cultural
expression takes the form of apologies — apologies such as
the World Economic Forum, in which I participated. There was not
one WEF panel or forum that embraces the thesis that democratic
capitalism must be strengthened, and its institutions protected.
You would think the leaders of the biggest companies and largest
market economies would want to weigh in on the yea side of this
statement. Instead, the panels — like mine on Intellectual
Property Rights and Global Poverty — will be filled with people
from Oxfam, Brazil, and South Africa who still see capitalism as
evil.
For instance,
here's what Oxfam thinks about capitalism as a model for social
and economic progress: "The success of China and Vietnam in
sustaining high growth with poverty reduction and equity since the
economic reforms of the late 1970s and mid-1980s respectively, underlines
the powerful effect of previous policies in redistributing assets
and creating opportunities through social investment." Other
panelists argue that patents are the major obstacles to public health
in their countries, despite their own nations' unwillingness to
invest in public-health systems, and despite the fact that many
drugs used to treat AIDS had no patents to begin with. The president
of South Africa is fighting a plan to distribute free medicine
that would reduce HIV in infants by 50 percent — even while
striving to make the case that stripping drug patents are the principal
means for promoting global health.
Both these
views will get a sympathetic hearing, more sympathetic at least
than my view of the world. Countries and governments that seize
property — intellectual or private — are not safe havens
for Jews or anyone else in the long run. Someone in my breakout
group suggested that intellectual property rights are in conflict
with human rights. But the first strike of the anti-globalists and
al Qaeda alike want to suppress the creative energies of men and
women wherever they seek to organize their energies to advance and
enrich themselves, their families, and communities. Without protection
of intellectual rights, the human condition diminishes.
I have no doubt
about Israel's determination to defend itself against Arafat and
other aggressors. What Mark Twain once wrote about the Jewish people
could be written about Israel — as both a state and a people
— today: "He has made a marvelous fight in this world,
in all the ages; and has done it with his hands tied behind him…
The Egyptian, the Babylonian and the Persian rose, filled the planet
with sound and splendor, then faded to dream-stuff and passed away;
the Greek and Roman followed, and made a vast noise and they are
gone; other peoples have sprung up and held their torch high for
a time, but it burned out and they sit in twilight now or have vanished."
The Jews, and
Israel, can survive in a post-Holocaust world thanks in part to
a religious heritage that weaves God, the people, the state, morality,
and human progress into the fabric of everyday life. But neither
the Jews nor Israel can survive in a world that does not dare to
defeat tyranny and evil when the opportunity arises — or that
gives up, in the elusive quest for redistribution, the individual
freedom to compete with and control what one creates. Just as President
Bush has urged the nations to stand with America against an Axis
of evil, so must those who live in democracies strengthen and expand
the force of free markets and free-market institutions.
In 1936, Arab
"nationalists" joined forces with the Nazis to run the
Jews out of Palestine. Today, another "nationalist" movement
is linking arms with global terrorist networks and using international
forums to generate world sympathy. Now that the lessons and carnage
have hit home, how can we expect to stand and secure our future
merely by saying, "Never Again"?
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