The alliance between the United States and Israel, although cemented by shared democratic values, is underpinned by geo-strategic realities, according to two prominent Middle East scholars.
Martin Kramer, a Senior Fellow at the Israel-based Shalem Center and the Wexler-Fromer Fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, writes that “a compelling realist argument can be made for viewing Israel as an asset to the West.”
Kramer says that strong American support for Israel guarantees U.S. influence and helps keep the peace in the eastern Mediterranean region. He argues that because Arab leaders know they cannot hope to militarily defeat an Israel strongly backed by the United States, there has not been a general Arab-Israeli war since 1973.
Because Israel is a strong and reliable military ally, the United States has been able to maintain order in the area without the commitment of any force. By contrast, because America does not have a strong ally like Israel in the Persian Gulf region, the United States must actually deploy its own forces at a tremendous cost.
Efraim Inbar, a professor of political science at Bar-Ilan University and the director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, writes that “the major challenges to U.S. diplomacy in the post-Cold War era—threats to the free flow of oil, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and Islamic terrorists—originate in the Middle East.” Thus, Israel, a country in the region that welcomes U.S. primacy in international affairs, is a natural strategic ally.
Inbar states: “There is no other state in the Middle East where an American airplane can count with certainty on being welcomed in the near future.” U.S.-Israel cooperation on security matters has only increased since the 9/11 attacks, Inbar notes, and Israel is also an important source of military technology.
