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“If you don’t know where you are going, you might end up somewhere else” – The Great Yogi

In analyzing and developing policies, an obvious prerequisite is defining and understanding your desired outcome:  The Endgame.  One of the problems that often occurs when people are talking about Israel, Palestine and the rest of the Middle East, is that they talk past each other.  They almost immediately get caught up arguing facts (or myths), history, speculation, generalization, demonization, almost any damn “-ation” you can name.  But often they never bother to try to understand the framework of their arguments.  What is the outcome that they are looking for?  How can one determine if they are right or wrong unless they know what goal they are trying to achieve.

It seems that the endgame for Israel was defined at its very birth.  It goes back to the original Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel which David Ben-Gurion read aloud in the sweltering heat of the former Dizengoff home, the Tel Aviv Museum of Art on 5 Iyar 5708 (May 14, 1948).  The very essence of what the country stands for is contained in the 13th paragraph:

THE STATE OF ISRAEL will be open for Jewish immigration and for the Ingathering of the Exiles; it will foster the development of the country for the benefit of all its inhabitants; it will be based on freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of Israel; it will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture; it will safeguard the Holy Places of all religions; and it will be faithful to the principles of the Charter of the United Nations.

I don’t think there can be a clearer, more succinct ideal that any of us who love the State of Israel could set for her.  And it follows from that that this should be the standard which the people of Israel and their institutions (government, the military, economic, and religious) should be measuring themselves against.  And fellow Jews everywhere should be  supporting Israel in reaching for that ideal. 

So, in summary, when analyzing policy decisions, using this definition, the endgame is the sustenance of Israel as the democratic homeland of the Jewish people.

Related Articles

• Welcome Richard Goldwasser & Blog Zahav (beyondzerosum.wordpress.com)
• What’s The Endgame? (andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com)