JERUSALEM – Around the world, peoples revel in anticipation of the fall of a regime that has denied its citizens their basic rights. But most Israelis are haunted by nightmare scenarios of ‘the day after’, as if their country’s stability was anchored in the continuity of the rule of Hosni Mubarak – not in peace.
Their instinctive reaction to the sight of the demonstrations in Tahrir Square was to barricade themselves behind the self-serving conventional wisdom that "Israel is a villa in the (Middle East) jungle," as Defense Minister Ehud Barak likes to say.
All of a sudden, the embattled Egyptian President is being hailed as Israel’s best friend in the Arab world, the key go-between with much of the Arab world. His beleaguered regime is longed for as the most significant strategic ally in the region, a security bulwark against Islamists.
ANTIWAR | 5 February 2011 - read full post
