Something strange happened to me last week. I began writing harsh words about a certain topic, and this, I like to think, is not my style. The computer, apparently, thought

We barely have enough Zionists within our own tribe.

so, too.


As I typed, or tried to type, the writing system I use started to go bonkers. The margins fluctuated all over the page and - well, nothing worked.


Was this a signal? Was I being told to stop? I remembered hearing I. B. Singer say that his pencil told him if he was on the right track or not. If he found his work requiring all kinds of erasures, he took it to mean that he was going poorly and ought to drop whatever he had going.


I also remembered something from our sages: "Not everything that man thinks must he say; not everything he says must he write; and not everything he has written must he publish." So I stopped what I was doing, which was surely the smart thing to do, and I even started to regret a column I wrote only the week before about Ann Coulter.


There is no need to go into that business all over again (Jews need to be "perfected"), as it's gotten enough attention in print and along the airwaves. I jumped in as well, and now I have second thoughts and regrets. I should have shut up. Did she really say something ignorant, intolerant, bigoted, anti-Semitic?


Re-reading the transcript, I find myself not so sure. Was she ignorant? Yes, for this too is where it's unwise to speak everything you think.


But my point here is about the reaction to Coulter - Coulter and the entire Evangelical movement. Coulter served as a catalyst for a larger dispute.


Speaking of intolerance, there seems to be an uprising among some righteous individuals against Zionist Christians. More than 50 million Christians here in America identify themselves as Zionists. Many raise money for Zion, travel to Israel for love of the people and the land, and others, it is true, seek to proselytize.


This last item appears to trouble a number of men and women within the Jewish Family; and, okay, we do not need the proselytizing. But to dismiss Zionist Christians as a group, most of whom (this is strictly my estimation) are pure of heart - is this smart? Is this the right enemy? Do Israelis have so many friends around the world that they can afford the luxury of casting aside Christians who courageously proclaim themselves Zionists?


We barely have enough Zionists within our own tribe. Too many of us are already into post-Zionism.


Just the other day, I happened to click on the Christian religious channel and found thousands waving Israeli flags and singing, "David, King of Israel." This Evangelical sermon was devoted to the theme "May G-d preserve and protect Israel." Everybody prayed.


These people separate themselves vigorously from other Christian denominations that binge against Israel. Are these (did I already say 50 million-plus?) the people Israel would rather do without?


This much is for sure. These are not the tenured academics (Jewish and Gentile) who denounce Israel from campus to campus. They do not demand the division of Jerusalem, but instead pray for its continued unification under a Jewish flag. They do not support (in fact, they defy) politicians who insist that Israel must be devoured by swarms of terrorists.


These are not the people who swear to wipe Israel off the map. Nor do they send out suicide bombers to deliver bloodshed. These are not the people who teach their children

Why can't Israel get it straight when it comes to separating friend from foe?

that Jews are pigs and that bloodshed glorifies heaven. They do not say that a shahid will be rewarded with 72 virgins.


Isn't that the enemy? Why can't Israel get it straight when it comes to separating friend from foe? Why, in other words, pick on our friends? If some are treyf, let G-d sort it out. There are plenty non-kosher Jews, as well, and they happen to run the government. These politicians operate the country like an Ebay "Going Out of Business Sale."


Damn her all you want, but Ann Coulter didn't surrender Jewish land and shake hands with the devil. That was Yitzchak Rabin and Ariel Sharon.


Fix that problem first. Test the Israeli politicians who curse the Land before you test Evangelicals who bless the Land and keep asking for a returned embrace. Perhaps I am too trusting and too quick to buy the message. But I happen to believe that Christians who say they are Zionists are Zionists.


At this rate of decay, corruption and betrayal within the Establishment - with every inch of territory at risk for all the concessions put before an intransigent enemy - my guess is that Israel would be in safer hands with men named Robertson at the helm than with men named Olmert.


If not all that, then an occasional hug will do.


Jack Engelhard's most recent novel, The Bathsheba Deadline, is now ready in paperback and available from Amazon.com and other outlets.