'Fear not, for time is on your side' (good story about Israel's survival)

Twenty years ago, while sipping tea on the terrace of the Houses of Parliament, a British Foreign Office type in a pinstripe suit, a bowler hat, and with a face as staid and melancholy as a teapot, solemnly confided to me the chilling private thought that the State of Israel would probably not exist in another 20 years. How could it? How could a few million Jews on a narrow strip of territory, without natural resources, indefinitely withstand the growing might of tens of millions of Arabs with all their natural wealth, not to speak of the billions of Muslims worldwide, with their fabulous riches?

"Just think of it," he said in his top-drawer accent, ruminating over his gloomy divination, "in 20 years' time the Palestinians will be catching up with you Jews numerically. Egypt's population alone will have burgeoned from 44 to 65 million, and Saudi Arabia's from six to 22. Multiply that by the Arab birthrate overall and what do you get? You get a raging horde of Arabs" - he drove his fist into his palm to illustrate the point - "most of whom will be younger than 35. There is no way Israel will be able to withstand that kind of hostile demographic pressure."

The Jeremiah's name was John (this was before he got his knighthood, and I shall not embarrass him by citing his surname). We met casually at a gathering to mark the anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, hosted by a group of parliamentarians - friends of Israel - in a Westminster reception hall. When the proceedings were done, he asked me if I would care to join him for tea on the terrace, and there, munching scones with Devonshire cream, he revealed that his father (whom he referred to as "pater") - a former Colonial Office man - was of an old Scottish lineage and a devout Presbyterian, as was he. Being related to the Balfours, he always made it a point to try and attend these annual commemorations in honor of Arthur James. In fact, he said, his father had been closely acquainted with Blanche (Baffy) Dugdale, Lord Balfour's niece and one of Chaim Weizmann's closest confidantes.

"Baffy used to conduct a Zionist lunching salon in the private room of a Soho restaurant to which my pater was often bid," he said. "He would dine in the company of such Christian Zionists as Orde Wingate, Wyndham Deedes, and C.P. Scott. Indeed, under my pater's guidance," he added with some fervor, "I had been strongly infused in the Hebraism of the Old Testament and the People of the Book. And I can tell you that the Christian religion and civilization owe to Judaism an immeasurable debt, shamefully ill repaid. Hence, the question of Israel's future welfare seems to me of immense moral importance."

He went on to recount, with the faintest beginnings of a smile, how back in the 1950s he had pulled family strings to get himself appointed as a junior diplomat to the British Embassy in Tel Aviv. "But I didn't last very long," he said wistfully, emitting a self-deprecating chuckle. "I was so pro-Zionist my ambassador thought I was stricken with what you call nowadays the Jerusalem syndrome. He cabled London to say I'd been overwhelmed by the Holy City's earth-shattering spiritual apparitions, and they promptly ordered me home. All my postings after that were to Eastern Europe where I became something of an expert on the Soviet bloc."

When we rose to part, he did something uncharacteristic for his British class, I thought. He put a familiar hand on my shoulder where it lingered for a moment or two and, in a voice cracked with anxiety, said, "It's simply bad luck, old chap. Bad luck has always stomped through the lives of you Jews. The balance is tipped against you. It will take a paradigm shift for things to go your way in the Middle East."

And, with that, he gave me a gentle pat and strode off with purposeful intent, his tight umbrella grasped upright like a Guardsman's sword.

AND THAT, I thought, would be the last I would see of him until, by one of those bizarre quirks of chance, we found ourselves some 10 years later staring at each other across the aisle of a London underground train, performing a minuet with our eyes and striving to divine where we had met before. His penny dropped first. "By George," he chirped, "you're the chap from Jerusalem at the Balfour Declaration do with whom I had tea years ago," and he pumped my hand, billowing with goodwill.

We both exited at Baker Street, he bound for the head offices of Marks and Spencer (where he now advised its chairman on Eastern European political and economic affairs), and I to the annual meeting of the British-Israel Chamber of Commerce that was convening on the same premises, and for which purpose I had come to London. Walking briskly with the ramrod posture of a British brigadier, with me trying to keep up at a smartened pace, he said with enormous vivacity, "Well, by George, things have changed in your part of the world since we last met, haven't they? A paradigm shift I would say."

And as he marched he began to poke the pavement with the tip of his tightly rolled umbrella, counting off the changes of fortune that had occurred in the Middle East in the recent past.

"One," he poked, "the Soviet Union and the Communist bloc have gone. Two: their Arab client states have lost their chief source of weaponry. Three: their war option is now largely eliminated. Four: the Gulf War has put Saddam Hussein in his place once and for all. Five: you've been talking peace with your enemies at Madrid. Six: you're finally negotiating directly with Yasser Arafat. Seven: you're bringing in tens of thousands of Russian immigrants, boosting your population by another million, I bet. Eight: your economic growth rate is topping 7.0%. Nine: your national per-capita income is hovering at $18,000. And 10: you have some form of diplomatic relations with nearly a dozen Arab countries."

And then, with a sudden stop and an abashed smile, he swung around and said, "Just think of it, there was I 10 years ago telling you that Israel wouldn't last another 20. Poppycock! Utter bollocks! A new Middle East is being born, old chap. A new Middle East."

We exchanged cards and assured each other we would stay in touch, which we did in a very casual sort of way. Twice he visited Israel - once in the late Nineties when he came with a Marks and Spencer review team, and again about a year and a half ago, shortly after September 11. By this time he had been elevated to a knighthood, was a senior fellow of the Institute of Strategic Studies, and had been touring Arab countries with the institute when September 11 struck.

Reaching Jerusalem from Jordan, we liaised at the bar of the King David Hotel where he was lodged. I could tell at a glance he was in a morose state because his face exuded that same staid, melancholy, teapot look again, but now it was even more accentuated by the sober dark suit and somber tie he was wearing amidst the high-spirited American crowd of tieless shirts, Hawaiian tops, cotton slacks, and blue jeans.

Brooding over a Scotch, he said above the hubbub that he and his colleagues had just visited four Arab countries. "And I can tell you, old chap, Islam is in crisis. It has been gripped by a self-destroying interpretation of the faith. The fundamentalists are spreading a religious totalitarianism whose goal is to destroy Western society, as we know it.

"Wherever we went, people were telling us that whatever the blemishes of Arab societies, they were the fault of the West - and of Israel as its proxy. Nowhere did we encounter self-criticism or introspection or moral inquiry - nothing but a culture of victimology and abdication; of honor and pride over rights and freedom. And Arab governments deliberately promote this scapegoat nonsense because they need an external enemy to retain power and subjugate their populations."

With that, he stared darkly at the table, his lips pursed into a frown of total disapproval like a bothered and aggrieved schoolmaster, and ordered another drink.

"September 11 has put paid to all our hopes for a new Middle East," he continued with profound exasperation, downing the glass. "And this bloody donnybrook of Iraq and al-Qaida, these two venomous heads of the same snake of Arab radicalism, is threatening us all. The question is, does Bush have the stamina to stick it out and stick it up 'em, hard and fast, or not? Western civilization depends on the answer."

Sir John was now truly tipsy but he, nevertheless, insisted on one more, which he downed in a swig. This caused him to talk elliptically about "Arafat's rabble" and "Saddam's swine" and "plucky Bush," and "IDF grit," and "we shall never surrender" and "home fires burning" and "silver linings."

When I escorted him to the elevator, he threw me a jaundiced look, pressed his lips together in pique, lifted his chin, and assumed all the dignity he could muster as the door glided shut.

NEXT MORNING he phoned to apologize: "Please understand, I reached your country from dry Arab lands. Forgive me, old chap."

We lost all contact after that - until last week, that is, when, out of the blue, he sent me an e-mail. Prompted, evidently, by Bush's extensive electoral triumph in the midterm Congressional elections, and by the unanimous Security Council vote on Iraq, he wrote: "I give you my view, shared, I know, by a goodly number of my colleagues at the institute, that this coming year, 2003, will be critical, perhaps the most critical since Israel's founding. But it shall be a good year, a year of high hope for your country.

"Two pivotal things shall happen in the course of this year, both of which will bring about a new geopolitical reality. One: Yasser Arafat will disappear in one way or another. And two: Saddam Hussein will disappear in one way or another. The consequence of Arafat's departure will be a new and more pragmatic Palestinian leadership with whom to talk. And the consequence of the demise of the Iraqi regime will be a more stabilized and defused Middle East with which to deal.

"President Bush will push his confrontation with Saddam Hussein to the very end. He will destroy him. The Security Council resolution has put Saddam in a box from which he cannot escape. He must disarm or die.

"Your country's fortunes in this coming test of wills shall suffer no injury. Every intelligence account I know shows that Iraq's missile capability is far less lethal now than it was last time round. On the other hand, your defensive capabilities are superior by far. And these capabilities will, in all likelihood, never be put to the test. For the highest priority of the US strategy will be to take out western Iraq first and fast, placing thereby whatever missiles Saddam has far beyond your country's range. That is how America will keep you out of the war.

"As for the Palestinians, post-Arafat and post-Saddam will gradually mollify your dealings with them. There shall be a progressive quelling of the suicide bomber scourge, paving the way for talks on some sort of an accommodation. After that, Syria will want to come to the table."

And then, as a final arpeggio, he could not resist an evangelical flourish: "Therefore, chins up, old chap. Stand fast. Be strong and of good courage. The tide is turning. The wind is at your back. Fear not - time is on your side."

The writer is a veteran diplomat who served as ambassador to Britain. He may be contacted at avner28@netvsion.net.il

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