Israel’s legitimacy is under attack in the free world, must be defended - opinion

The map of threats against Israel is crowded, and we are straining every muscle to thwart them. They loom in the south, the north, and the east. But one serious threat – perhaps the gravest in the long term – is being neglected: the very legitimacy of Israel’s existence is under assault by voices in the free world.

Israel has managed to survive as a villa in the regional jungle partly because it is seen as an overseas extension of the West. The villa’s extensive system of ties with that world – on the cultural, economic, diplomatic, and, of course, security fronts – has served as Israel’s safety net.

Whatever the cause of this demonization – classic antisemitism on the Right, progressive antisemitism on the Left, the sting of the Qatari scorpion, Israeli government policies perceived as extremist, the spirals of venom on social media, and more – it must not be accepted as a decree of fate.

There is a temptation to curl up into fatalism – “the whole world is against us,” or “Esau hates Jacob” – and hope for the best.

Another temptation is to focus on the half-full glass: the friends we still have, such as India, the Evangelicals, and countries ruled by authoritarian regimes.

But that would be an irresponsibility of the highest order. The consoling image of “a people that dwells alone” is a strategic danger to the future of the Zionist project.

The free world was saved during World War II when the ideas of Franklin Roosevelt triumphed over those of Charles Lindbergh, an extreme isolationist and antisemite who sympathized with Hitler and considered running for president before backing down.

We must mobilize the national resources we have accumulated to change the narrative that attacks the legitimacy of Zionism, and to drain the swamp of consciousness from which these wild shoots grow.

We cannot be content with help from Jews overseas – like AIPAC – or with another Israeli hasbara (public diplomacy) campaign.

A paradigm shift is needed. That shift will come only when we internalize that the struggle for our existence is decided not only at our borders, but also in how the free world sees us.

We invest more than NIS 100 billion a year in defending our borders, but spend only pennies, in national terms, on the battlefield of global consciousness. This neglect may have existential consequences.

The battle is far from lost. What is needed is Ben-Gurionist leadership that grasps the depth of the challenge and tackles it professionally and decisively.

Professionalism means pooling knowledge and expertise, developing a “war doctrine” suited to the new reality, mapping the field, shaping a narrative, designing tools to disseminate it, building international partnerships, and more.

Decisiveness requires understanding that change is required across the board. Alongside physical national security, entrusted to bodies that operate at home (the IDF and Shin Bet [Israel Security Agency]) and abroad (the Mossad), Israel must entrust the cognitive sphere – the national security of consciousness – to a new dedicated entity: a nonpartisan state body like the other security agencies, with generous long-term funding befitting the challenge, and under the direct responsibility of the Prime Minister’s Office or the Defense Ministry. This is not “just” about foreign relations or the protection of Diaspora Jews. It is, emphatically, at the core of national security.

Because this is a matter of “influence,” careful attention must be paid to how the responsibilities should be divided, making use of the relative advantages of the state on one hand and the private sector on the other.

National security depends not only on victories in Bint Jbail or Rafah, but also on the battlefields of consciousness in Washington, Berlin, and Paris.