I had a columnar senior moment today:

Aside from a tiny strip of land on the east bank of the Jordan, every other advanced society on earth is content to depend for its security on the kindness of strangers.

Er, I was referring to Israel, which isn’t on the east bank, or on much of the west these days. No one to blame but myself: I’ve been back and forth across the Allenby Bridge enough times to know which end leads where. I think I meant to say “the eastern shore of the Mediterranean”, but who knows? It’s Ahmadinejad who’s in favor of “relocating” the Zionist Entity, not me. Mea culpa.