One of the least attractive features of American society compared to other Western nations is its glorification of youth. I recall an interview decades ago with actor Paul Hogan lamenting this fact in light of his attaining a starring role in the small-budget Australian film Crocodile Dundee, something he didn’t think a US movie studio would ever have approved for an actor already in his upper forties. For Hogan, the issue was expressing his talent at such an “advanced” age; for others like me it was the frequency with which the US media regularly surveyed the opinion of entertainment airheads on the weighty issues of the day.
But while back then Americans were directed to Alec Baldwin and Yoko Ono for their sagacious assurances that nuclear disarmament would keep the world safe, today’s young “influencers” on both the left and the right call for genocide against Jews and praise Adolf Hitler. That is America’s future unless enough decent Americans can stop the spread of malignant antisemitism on time.
Vice President JD Vance is not likely to be one of them. Taking questions at a Turning Point USA event Thursday, Vance responded to one such airhead antisemite, who said (to enthusiastic applause):
"I’m a Christian man, and I’m just confused why there’s this notion that we might owe Israel something or that they are our greatest ally or that we have to support this multi-hundred-billion dollar foreign aid package to Israel to cover this - to quote Charlie Kirk - ethnic cleansing in Gaza. I’m just confused why this idea has come around, considering that not only does their religion not agree with ours, but openly supports the prosecution of ours.”
Rather than refute this “confused” young man’s lies about Judaism “prosecuting” Christianity or Charlie Kirk’s stand on the Gaza war, Vance assured the audience that Israel is not “controlling this president of the United States,” leaving open the implication that it might have controlled others.
-He also acknowledged the “religious differences,” somehow neglecting to mention his own Hindu wife’s differences with his Christian audience.
-For good measure, Vance assured his TPUSA audience that “we are making sure Israel protects the Church of the Holy Sepulcher” as if Israel weren’t already doing that in the absence of American demands.
Vance’s flirtation with the antisemitic assumptions of his party’s young Turks (or young jerks) as he needs their votes, together with his boss’s unmasked willingness to seek control over Israel, should serve as a wake-up call for Israeli politicians and policymakers for a “day after” plan (i.e., the day after Israel secured the release of its hostages with Trump’s help). Whether the US-Israeli honeymoon has already ended or will endure for the remaining days of the Trump Administration, a pro-Israel American majority can no longer be assumed given the growing appeal of raw Jew hatred in America.
What’s more, Trump’s pressuring of Israel not to apply Israeli law over Judea and Samara may bring the same result his pressuring Israel not to apply Israeli law over the Jordan Valley did in 2020-namely the transfer of power to a party that more authentically expresses neo-colonialist overlordship. With that, here are elements of plan that will help Israel prepare for President AOC in 2029.
First, Israel should send a thank-you note to America for its past defense aid and eschew any additional gifts. America will have to find other ways to subsidize its defense contractors and battle-test their equipment. From Israel’s point of view, the imperative is to fend off American control, as when the Biden Administration shipped off armaments stored in Israel to Ukraine and withheld promised and needed weapons and ammunition during an existential war, and as when President Trump threatened to withdraw US support if Israel exercised its sovereignty and Vance took “insult” to it.
Israel has retarded its own defense industry by sustaining this very unkosher defense pork.
Second, Israel should cultivate proxy fighters throughout the region. It’s exhausting fighting a so-called “seven-front” war (it’s more like a thousand). When President AOC enters office, she will doubtlessly base her Middle East policy (as did Obama and Biden) on whatever most advances jihad; though this is not in America’s interests, twisted woke ideology, which despises America, demands it. It is therefore time to establish a Druzeland in southern Syria, thus rewarding brothers who have proven their willingness to fight at our side.
But northern Syria is also a hornet’s nest. And Turkey, Iraq and Iran are constant thorns on our side. Time therefore to encourage the emergence of Kurdistan, something the US has inexplicably failed to do after Kurds proved to be their most reliable allies in previous Middle East adventures.
Meanwhile, Israel’s peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan are not worth the paper they’re written on. Their pro-Western regimes are assumed to bring stability to the region, but in reality they’re more interested in feeding their jihad-addled populations anti-Israel propaganda. If the Mossad is not already doing so, it is a good time to cultivate certain Bedouin partners in the Sinai and in Jordan (such as the large Bani Hassan tribe, one of whose representatives recently visited the Kotel and affirmed the Zionist intentions of the Koran) rather than wait for these countries’ fickle leaders to further turn on Israel or to fall to the Muslim Brotherhood.
Israel’s best relationship in the Arab world today is with the UAE; now’s a good time to scout out alternative emirs who might rule Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia. There are seven emirates in the UAE. Qatar could become the eighth, although a new name would help the terror hub rebrand under UAE rule.
Israel seems to have finally shut down the Houthis, but Yemen is currently unfixable and the strategic Horn of Africa region unstable. Israel should take measures to strengthen Eritrea and Somaliland as counterweights to the region’s bad actors.
Iran is still reeling from Israeli (and US) blows, but the Mossad has been working around the clock to undermine this teetering regime; still, more must be done to bring about regime change or, minimally, make Iran appear an undesirable partner for President AOC. Highlighting the regime’s violent humiliation of women might raise the level of embarrassment AOC would experience in throwing US support to the regime.
Shrinking Iran, by helping Azerbaijan acquire its ethnic Azerbaijani chunk and Kurdistan an adjacent Kurdish chunk, would also tamp down Democrat dreams of a revived Persian Empire.
Finally, President AOC can dispatch Secretary of State Mamdani for a tongue wagging if she wishes, but 3,401 new housing units in the E1 corridor connecting Jerusalem to Ma’ale Adumim will supply the facts on the ground Israel would need to shield itself against any of their deranged “peace” plans. Ditto if President Vance sends Secretary of State Carlson.
Gil Weinreich is the author of Who Killed Rav Adda bar Abba?: A Talmudic Murder Mystery, a work of historical fiction set in the Persian empire in the fourth century CE.