Toward a New Model for the U.S.–Israel Relationship

The roots of Israel’s bond with the U.S. run deep—preceding the establishment of the state. Immediately after the end of World War II, when British government policy in Palestine, led by Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin, was outright hostile to the Zionist project, David Ben-Gurion nevertheless made a bold prophecy to the crusty British statesman. Like it or not, he said to Bevin, a confrontation was coming between the Western allies and the Russians—and the Jews, like them or not, would be on the side of Britain and the West.

And so it came to pass: in the post-Holocaust era, things could not have been otherwise. Although the coming cold war was still but a vague shape on the horizon, the Zionist national project was bound almost by definition to be counted among the defenders of democracy led by the United States. The “special relationship” between Israel and America, which in its present form far exceeds Ben-Gurion’s fondest dreams, is the direct product of that fundamental fact.

As described by Charles D. Freilich in his essay, “Has Israel Grown Too Dependent on the United States?,” the relationship today is an impressive edifice indeed. Having been there as both scholar and practitioner—he held the position of Israeli deputy national security adviser a few years before I did—Freilich is well positioned to judge the supreme value of the American contribution to Israel’s safety and survival.