Victor Poulos

The problem here is not that the speakers brought a bad message. Never shoot the messenger. It is important to heed warnings, unpleasant as they may be. In that, these speakers did a service. The problem is they asked Israelis to indulge the breakdown of American youth into a generation of uninformed, lost, largely entitled souls whining of failed expectations of what was owed them, who blame everything on the unfair burden of being a great power, complain of Jews who manipulate American power, while still wanting the sort of lifestyle and benefits of being a great power. They want isolationism but don’t want the consequences of it. So there was a brilliant opportunity given those who came to Jerusalem to observe around them a young generation of Israeli Jews infused with national pride, confident, giving their all rather than asking, slogging through the dust of Gaza and mud of Lebanon, burning the midnight oil devising ingenious solutions to critical defense issues, and sacrificing themselves to defend their lives, their loves and their homes. A group of youth carrying on their shoulders consciously the weight of thousands of years of Western civilization. A young, vibrant society in which family, fertility and faith eclipse any other industrialized country. Sadly, a few of these visitors missed that opportunity to see what can be learned from Israel and instead saw it as their mission to lecture Israel and suggest indulgence of American youth engaged in silly debates detached from reality, guided by broken moral compasses, and expressing a sense of entitlement that expects their futures delivered them rather than demands of the youth to take control and make something of their lives. A youth that isn’t marrying, isn’t healthily dating, and isn’t having children. A youth lacking a sense of commitment to defending the nation and being a link in the chain of civilization. In short, there was no sense of “Houston, we have a problem, so what can we learn from Israel and work together to see how the generational breakdown can fixed?” Instead, there was a suggestion that Israel has to stop asking America to fight its wars (which is a misplaced and wrong assumption to begin with) and ignore anti-Semitism, a complacency every Jew knows in the end leads to death. It was essentially a surrender: live and adjust to the problem rather than fix it. American greatness was built by real Americans over fifteen generations who tackled problems and the frontier, not surrender to the magnitude of the task. Israeli greatness is being built by these new generations of Jews who are strongly reminiscent of the great waves of previous American generations. The lecturers might in part have missed a brilliant opportunity to come, to watch, to observe and to learn how the edge of Western civilizational survival is now is defended by a new generation of Israeli youth. They would have seen that Western civilization rests on Israel’s success rather than bowing to youth smitten by conspiracy theories who panic and blame Jews over the cost of their Burritos’ being delivered to their homes by UberEats.