New Israel

Editor’s note: If you don’t read the entire article, please go to the end and read the final comments.
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As a boy, my father told me a number of things important to him. One was that he bought as many State of Israel bonds he could afford, to help Israel in its time of need. If elected next year, perhaps I can help in a different way.

For decades, I have watched and read about our repetitive, traditional efforts to help Israel, all based on giving money and weapons. Those efforts have failed to provide peace. We must do something different. If we don’t one day Israel’s enemies will win, as it only takes a single win to severely damage Israel. The finger pointing, as to who’s to blame in Washington, will begin.

Israel still needs help. This country formed in 1948, is a tiny 8,019 square miles (metro Atlanta is larger) but has been ground zero for one of the most significant, persistent and ongoing conflicts of the modern world.

The United States has spent over $118 billion to help Israel survive and prosper. When adjusted for inflation, that’s nearly one-half trillion dollars! Each American family has “donated” over three thousand dollars of their inflation-adjusted tax dollars to help Israel with no end in sight. In the next four years, our government has agreed to give them twelve billion dollars in military aid alone.

After the 1967 Six-Day War Israel increased its size by 503 square miles, plus seized 2,880 square miles of the disputed West Bank and other territories.

As you know, the source of much of the global terrorism is the intractable resistance of the Palestinians, the PLO, Hamas, Fatah, Hezbollah, other nation states and their sympathizers. The only solution was to back Israel at every opportunity, and continue to spend countless billions while suffering from perpetual domestic and international terrorism risks directed at American citizens.

Therefore here’s a solution, that I call New Israel. New Israel can be the new promised land, where peace and prosperity can dominate, not risk, war and fear that exists in the State of Israel today and in the future. And no, I’m not Moses II.

In a nutshell, Israel returns the occupied territories that it seized, and has been building settlements on, and we give them approximately the same size land here that becomes a part of Israel. The original pre-1967 Israel stays as is, but only the seized land is returned. It’s a land swap for peace.

We create a New Israel in the United States, a second non-contiguous part of Israel that can coexist with the country created in 1948. In the same way that Israel was created, we could unilaterally do it again, but this time in Texas (or in another state such as Florida’s sparsely populated north-west coast, south of Perry, FL) where the climate is similar and so the Israelis have access to the Gulf of Mexico for international trade.

Texas is such a big state that you could drop Israel into it over thirty times, with room to spare. I believe that we could carve out ~2,880 square miles (the size of the Israeli occupied areas) where I’ve circled on this map without impacting Texas, except in a positive way. That land is slightly more than 1% the size of Texas.

It will create an instant job boom in Texas. There would be so many construction projects that Texas will become the leader in new job creation. Instead of high unemployment, Texas will have full employment. If you want a job, you’ll have plenty of offers. Many of the problems associated with low paying, or no jobs will vanish. It will be boom times for Texas.

Before you dismiss this idea, although no one is doing anything else but treading water, think of this. It’s common that countries are discontiguous, or that countries have geographically separate areas but are one nation.

Even in our instance, neither Alaska and Hawaii are a part of the lower forty-eight, but are still part of the sovereign United States. The same logic can apply for New Israel. This is not new to the State of Israel; Mount Scopus was considered to be part of Israel, an Israeli exclave located in Jordan until the Six-Day War.

This is the sparsely populated area that New Israel could be located

1 If Texans own property within the borders of New Israel, our government would offer far more than the value of the property, or pay for it under eminent domain laws and relocate our citizens. Fortunately, not many Americans live in that very small part of Texas. It doesn’t even have public highways.

If these few people want to stay on their properties, and the Israeli government allows it (they will), they can become “in-place” immigrants while keeping U.S. citizenship and travel freely back and forth. In any instance, they will become rich and could live anywhere they want. If you lived there and our government offered to make you rich by selling your property, and you could still live on your property, what would you do?

Generosity is key to reducing or eliminating problems.

2 We would use the billions of dollars normally sent to the State of Israel and give it to the New Israel instead. This will help develop their new territory using American and Israeli construction companies. As Texas would surround New Israel on three sides, Texas will have a large economic benefit from proximity trade that will offset its loss of territory.

Some of those billions can be used to relocate willing Israeli citizens to their New Israel, the new promised land.

As an aside, in the 1960’s the Australian government paid white U.K. citizens to relocate to Australia. Australia used to be the British penal colony. Amazingly, in that era the Australian government classified the indigenous Australians, the Aborigines, as fauna, or plants, their children were taken away and their working conditions, squalid! Fortunately, much has changed.

It’s now a prosperous, beautiful and peaceful country that people are eager to emigrate to. I think that Israelis would flock to New Israel so they can prosper in peace, rather than live in never-ending fear.

Israel has another significant problem at this time: the Israeli Arabs are increasing their population much faster than the Israeli Jews. The risk is that in a few years, the Israeli Arabs will outvote the Israeli Jews, and Israel as a Jewish state may end. New Israel will continue to be a Jewish state forever.

3 This New Israel will only be created after Israel returns the West Bank and relocates its settlers back to either pre-1967 Israel, or New Israel. With that peace accord, tensions will be lowered as will oil prices and the price of gasoline. This could start another global economic boom, as confidence and positive sentiment are the keys to prosperity.

This may be an out-of-the-box idea, but it’s an idea worth serious exploration. We cannot continue to pump money and resources into Israel without some serious policy changes. Eventually, we have to stop knocking our heads against the wall and find a real, and not a pretend solution.

This is it.

Finally, before you discount this article, watch this 60 Minutes report on Tel Aviv. You’ll understand why the Israeli’s live for today, because tomorrow is uncertain. This story brings to mind the Isaiah 22:13 quotation – “… let us eat and drink; for tomorrow we shall die.”