Rumsfeld Defends Israel, Europeans Not So Much

By
Omri Ceren
– February 11, 2004Posted in: Europe

Donald Rumsfeld is a pretty funny guy:


Israel is a small state with a small population. It’s a democracy and it exists in a neighborhood [in which many have]… opined from time to time that they’d prefer it not be there and they’d like it to be put in the sea. And Israel has opined that it would prefer not to get put in the sea, and as a result, over a period of decades, it has arranged itself so it hasn’t been put in the sea

That seems pretty clear. The Europeans disagree, and of course fetishistically insist that context doesn’t matter and that Israel should give up its nukes. Context, cause and effect, and above all else consequences don’t matter when all you care about is process. The Europeans are willing to try to stick Israel to the letter of international law even when the spirit of that law – self defense – would be endangered by the subsequent situation, in which the Arabs might a conventional attack because they would think that it could succeed or they might launch a non-conventional attack because they would think that Israel would have no way to retaliate.

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