United Arab Republic (1958-1971)

Submitted by Robert (United States), Jan 8, 2023 at 16:37

At least your reader David needs to take a closer look at the history of Pan-Arabism, particularly during Nasser's "reign" as the beloved leader of the Arab world; during this period, from 1958 to 1971 Syria were (politically) united as a single sovereign Arab state known as the United Arab Republic. That union fell apart 4 years after the defeat by Israel known as the Six Day War.

By the time of the Arab Spring, Syria emerged as a Shia dominated state closer to Iran than to Sunni and Coptic Egypt. And just as Syria was about to fall apart again, but to the Sunni majority, Russia stepped in together with Iran and Lebanon's Hezbollah.

The point I'm now making, in the context of Pan-Arabism and Muslim struggles, a new, non-Muslim power, Orthodox Christian Russia under Putin is now in the Middle East on the border of Jewish Israel. That makes, Strategically, Israel not alone as a non-Muslim force in the region. This must have strong political, ideological, and religious consequences which makes Israel less of a "foreign" intruder. It is for this reason not in Israel's best interests to make Russia Israel's enemy. There is no way that Ukraine can contribute to Israel's interests the way Russia can. In fact, many of Israel's Jewish citizens (over a million) are former Russian citizens, and it is known that this fact is very attractive to Putin. I wonder how many Russian Oligarchs have take refuge in Israel? Especially, under Biden's Democratic administration, with it's fantasy of a two-state solution any time soon, and America's non-orthodox Jews supporting mostly the Democratic administration, Israel has much more to gain by keeping a door open to Russia, just as many other "neutral" countries in the world are doing.

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