Volume 4 No 1 - Journal for the Study of Antisemitism

2012] HONORS 353
and that the real perpetrators were members of the Popular Front for the
Liberation of Palestine, who intended to target Jews, not Italians, with their
explosives. Under the circumstances, the Italian government made no
attempt to prosecute the perpetrators.
If the Jews of Europe had a fundamental flaw during the Holocaust, it
was that they had neither the numbers nor the weapons with which to
defend themselves; put differently, they lacked effective sovereignty. This
was, of course, nothing new, but the gravity of that deficiency had only
become fully apparent when they were confronted with a unique foe determined
on their extermination. Moreover, extermination invited repetition.
From the end of the war to this day, there have been those who promised to
complete Hitler’s work, and their voices have become louder and more
numerous recently.
Fortunately, bitter experience has taught a critical mass of Jews that an
adversary who promises to destroy them and actively seeks the weapons
with which to carry out the threat must be believed. That is at the heart of
the crisis between Israel and Iran; it is also at the heart of the crisis between
Israel and radical Islam. Ironically, Israel’s most potent weapons may be the
Dolphin-class attack submarines produced by German firms and partly
financed by the government of Angela Merkel. These submarines are said
to be capable of launching cruise missiles with 200kg nuclear warheads at a
range of 1,500 km or more. What this means is that the submarines and the
Israeli Air Force provide that nation with devastating, second-strike, retaliatory
capability. Unfortunately, however, even this awesome capacity will
not defend adequately against an enemy prepared to sacrifice millions of its
own people out of messianic, apocalyptic zeal.
No one can predict the outcome of combat between Israel and its enemies,
but how different is Israel’s situation from that of Europe’s Jews during
the Second World War. Israel’s Jews have the one thing the Jews of
Europe never possessed: the capacity, if necessary, to render catastrophic
retaliatory damage to enemies that threaten them with annihilation. That
capacity may be the ultimate significance of effective sovereignty, and it
may also be the only thing that the Israelis can ultimately rely on. Certainly,
they cannot rely on the United Nations, with its 56 Muslim member nations,
or on the paper promises of the Israeli-Egyptian Treaty of 1979. Nor can
they even rely on the friendship of the United States. As Charles De Gaulle
and Lord Palmerston have observed, Nations have no friends, only interests.
I would add, “as perceived, rightly or wrongly, by a nation’s leaders.”
These are, I believe, some of the bitter lessons I have learned, having
lived through the age of actual genocide and, now, the threat of future genocide.
At the age of 88, I hope to continue my writing, teaching, and religious
and inter-religious activities, as long as I am blessed with the strength