The Left Lost Its Logic On Israel - Noah Beck ISRAEL TODAY

The Left Lost Its Logic On Israel

Thursday, January 26, 2017 |  Noah Beck  ISRAEL TODAY

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Originally written for the Investigative Project on Terrorism

Support for Israel among Democrats has plummeted in recent years, a new Pew poll shows, with about as many – 31 percent – saying they sympathize more with the Palestinians than with Israel, which garnered 33 percent support.

By contrast, 74 percent of Republicans surveyed sympathize more with the Jewish state. That is the widest partisan gap since 1978.

A similar poll last year found a deep divide within the party, with conservative and moderate Democrats favoring Israel over the Palestinians by 53-19 percent.

This trend has accelerated during President Barack Obama's tenure. During Israel's 2014 war with Hamas, 61 percent of Democrats sympathized with Hamas and hundreds of left-wing historians openly sided with the terrorist group.

Bernie Sanders, whose liberal support nearly won him the 2016 Democratic primary, sought to empower anti-Israel figures like Cornel West – a supporter of the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement – and James Zogby of the Arab American Institute.

President Obama's refusal to veto an anti-Israel U.N. resolution last month was ranked as the most anti-Semitic incident of 2016 by the Simon Wiesenthal Center. When Congress condemned that resolution, U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison, a leading contender to run the Democratic National Committee, voted against it.

This hostility toward Israel is not limited to the American Left.

In the UK, it often coincides with anti-Semitism. As Jonathan Tobin observed, Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn has been "openly sympathetic with Hamas and Hezbollah," has "campaigned for the release of terrorists convicted of attacking Jewish targets," and "praised vicious anti-Semites." The co-chairman of the Oxford University Labour Club resigned after the organization voted to endorse Israel Apartheid Week. The club has a growing record of anti-Semitic and anti-Israel incidents. Last May, Britain's Labour Party secretly suspended 50 of its members for anti-Semitic and racist comments.

France's left-wing government just convened a 70-nation "peace conference" that was hostile to Israel

. France has summoned far less international pressure to the exponentially bloodier conflict next door in Syria. Moreover, the French government funds French, Israeli, and Palestinian organizations that support and promote BDS campaigns against Israel, a report by NGO Monitor shows. Such boycotts are illegal under French law.

France also funds several other NGOs with alleged ties to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) terror group, the report notes.

In the West, the political left considers itself "progressive," yet it increasingly targets the only Mideast country that actually embraces progressive values such as the rule of law, gender and sexual equality, and freedom of religion and speech. "Progressives" attack the only Mideast country making progress for all of humanity in science, technology, and medicine – from a crowdsourced solution to traffic (Waze) to breakthrough research on melanoma and leukemia.

Yet, on university campuses, where the minds of future politicians are formed, hatred of Israel and Jews has become endemic. The AMCHA Initiative, a non-profit organization that tracks BDS and anti-Semitic activity on U.S. campuses, reported more than 600 instances of such activity in 2016.

So why do liberals embrace illiberal players in the Arab-Israeli conflict? Double standards, underdog favoritism, media bias and group think, and prejudice at institutions like the United Nations.

Because Israel is a country of laws and Western values, Western critics often hold Israel to a standard that no democracy could meet. Alan Dershowitz captures the standard that should apply: "Name a single country in the history of the world faced with internal and external threats comparable to those faced by Israel that has ever had a better record in human rights; a better record with compliance of the rule of law; a better record of concern for civilians?"

In addition, media coverage often is skewed by Palestinian intimidation and deception, by reporters who uncritically favor underdogs, and by sloppy journalism and outright bias.

Hamas physically intimidates journalists who dare to defy its propaganda goals, thus distorting both the "facts" and the photos distributed to the world.

"Pallywood" – the practice of staging casualties and defaming Israel – has been deceiving journalists for at least 16 years. A particularly galling Pallywood example from 2015 was the inflammatory lie – by "moderate" Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas – that Israeli forces "executed" a 13-year old after an attempted terrorist attack. The truth: the child was treated in the same Israeli hospital as the boy he tried to murder.

Even Amnesty International acknowledged the unreliability of "eyewitnesses" in the conflict.

By contrast, during the 2014 war, Hamas executed 23 Gazans and tortured dozens of others.

In September 2015, Hamas imprisoned Gazans for protesting over a lack of electricity, causing some Gazans to admit that they prefer Israeli rule to Hamas.

Consistently sloppy journalism also poisons public opinion against Israel. News organizations often fail to identify the terrorist and the victim when reporting on Arabs killed by Israelis trying to defend themselves from a terrorist attack. Such missing context creates the false impression that Israelis wake up every morning asking how they can hurt Arabs.

The BBC's distortions often turn terrorists into victims. Its bias is so egregious that even its former chief complained:

"Regrettably, this is not the first time the standard of reporting and impartiality has been unsatisfactory in recent weeks. On Saturday 3rd October, I was disappointed to see the BBC News website publish a misleading and counter-factual headline: 'Palestinian shot dead after Jerusalem attacks kills two'. I note reports that this headline underwent four revisions following public criticism." The BBC's horrible headlines continue, describing the terrorist in last month's Jerusalem track-ramming attack as a "Driver of a lorry...allegedly ramming pedestrians."

Worse still, mainstream political figures sometimes promote anti-Israel calumnies. Last April, Sanders claimed that Israelis killed "over 10,000 innocents in Gaza," an estimate nearly seven times higher than Hamas's propaganda estimate of civilian deaths. Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes falsely claimed in a recent PBS interview that Israel has built "thousands of new settlements" (rather than about 200). PBS never corrected this falsehood.

Thus, the "free press," which is supposed to act as a check on the government, ends up abetting its misinformation campaign against Israel.

The Obama administration and most of the political left promote a kind of anti-settlement religion that blames the lack of peace with the Palestinians on settlements. This position ignores the last century of Arab Muslim attacks on Israelis, starting decades before any settlements existed. The anti-settlement religion axiomatically affirms that settlements are illegal, even though legal scholars have concluded otherwise. The same religion also ignores Israel's removing the settlement of Yamit for peace with Egypt in 1982, and its unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in 2005. Those actions did nothing to persuade Palestinians to pursue peace, as they responded with more than 10,000 jihadi rocket attacks aimed at Israeli civilians.

Liberal support for illiberal players is illogical and counterproductive. If "progressives" choose only to blame Israel and never ask Palestinians to embrace liberal values, stop their incitement to violence, renounce terror, and accept Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people, then such "liberals" have mislabeled themselves while making peace less likely.

Noah Beck is the author of The Last Israelis, an apocalyptic novel about Iranian nukes and other geopolitical issues in the Middle East.

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John Kerry Unveils His Plan For A Palestinian State Based Upon 1967 Borders With East Jerusalem As The Capital - Michael Snyder THE ECONOMIC COLLAPSE BLOG

John Kerry Unveils His Plan For A Palestinian State Based Upon 1967 Borders With East Jerusalem As The Capital

Posted: 28 Dec 2016   Michael Snyder  THE ECONOMIC COLLAPSE BLOG

Barack Obama stabbed Israel in the back on Friday, and now John Kerry has slapped Israel in the face just five days later.  In a shameful speech that lasted for 71 dreadful minutes, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry laid out his plan for peace in the Middle East on Wednesday.  His six-part plan is being welcomed warmly by the Palestinians, but it has further infuriated the Israelis. 

Kerry claims that his plan reflects the emerging global consensus as to what a “final solution” will look like, and now we will wait to see what the 70 nations that will be gathering in France to discuss the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on January 15th will do.  There is a great deal of concern that the principles agreed upon at that conference will form the basis for a UN Security Council resolution that will be rushed to a vote before President-elect Donald Trump is inaugurated on January 20th.

The core of Kerry’s plan is the division of the land of Israel into two states.  The borders between Israel and “Palestine” would be based upon the 1967 ceasefire lines with mutually agreed upon land swaps.  The following comes from ynetnews.com…

Outgoing US Secretary of State John Kerry laid out the Obama administration’s parameters for peace between Israel and the Palestinians during a speech at the State Department on Wednesday that lasted 71 minutes, one of the longest in US State Department history.
Breaking sharply from longstanding US policy that foreign powers shouldn’t impose a solution, Kerry unveiled a six-part outline of what a future peace deal could look like. The outline tracked closely with principles long assumed to be part of an eventual deal, and Kerry insisted he was merely describing what’s emerged as points of general agreement.
Primarily, Kerry called to create a secure and recognized border between Israel and a contiguous Palestine along the 1967 lines, with “mutually agreed, equivalent (land) swaps.”

As part of the land swaps, Kerry insists that the Palestinians must be given land that connects the West Bank and the Gaza strip.  In his speech he stated that “Palestine must be viable and contiguous”, and he made it exceedingly clear that East Jerusalem will be the capital of the new Palestinian state.

Of course UN Security Council Resolution 2334 has already given the entire West Bank and every inch of East Jerusalem to the Palestinians.  So the only thing that another UN Security Council resolution would be needed for would be to formally establish a Palestinian state.
Kerry went on to say that if Israel does not accept a two-state solution “it will not have peace with the rest of the Arab world, I can guarantee that.”

Of course Kerry is half-correct in making that statement, because Israel will not have peace with the rest of the Arab world even if a Palestinian state is established.  In fact, the establishment of a Palestinian state would actually make war much more likely.
Kerry also shockingly claimed that “Israel can either be Jewish or democratic”…

Kerry said a two-state solution, which calls for an independent Palestinian state existing peacefully alongside Israel, is the only way to guarantee the Jewish state’s long-term security in the region.
“If the choice is one state, Israel can either be Jewish or democratic, it cannot be both,” Kerry said.

Needless to say, Kerry’s speech sparked a tremendous amount of outrage among pro-Israel leaders here in the United States.

Yes John Kerry, if only this orange sliver was smaller there would be peace. pic.twitter.com/afvRO0O9Kq

— Dave Rubin (@RubinReport) December 28, 2016

One of the leaders that is condemning Kerry’s remarks is U.S. Senator Ted Cruz.  In a strongly worded statement, he accused Barack Obama and John Kerry of being “relentless enemies of Israel”…

Ted Cruz, a Republican senator and 2016 presidential candidate, lit into Kerry and Obama in a statement that accused of them being ‘bitter clingers.’
They’re ‘spending every last minute of this administration wreaking havoc domestically and abroad,’ he said.
‘These acts are shameful. They are designed to secure a legacy, and indeed they have: history will record and the world will fully understand Obama and Kerry as relentless enemies of Israel.’

And Donald Trump is speaking out as well.  On Twitter, he let the world know what he thinks about how the Obama administration has been treating Israel…

“We cannot continue to let Israel be treated with such total disdain and disrespect,” Trump tweeted. “The beginning of the end was the horrible Iran deal, and now this (U.N.!) Stay strong, Israel, January 20th is fast approaching!”

In response, Barack Obama actually got on the phone and called Donald Trump in an attempt to smooth things over.

After eight years of failure, Barack Obama has saved the very worst for last.  With less than 30 days to go in his presidency, he has chosen this moment to betray Israel, and by doing so he has greatly cursed America.

I don’t get upset about a lot these days, but this is something that is worth getting upset about.  If Obama would have just left things alone, everything would have been fine.  But instead of deferring to the next president on important matters, Obama has chosen to implement a “scorched earth policy” during his final month in the White House.

As we move into 2017, our relationship with Israel is going to be one of the biggest political issues that we are facing.

If you are anti-Israel, you are with Barack Obama, John Kerry, Hillary Clinton, the United Nations and all the rest of the globalists that are obsessed with dividing the land of Israel.

If you are pro-Israel, you are with Donald Trump, Mike Pence, Ted Cruz and all of the other brave leaders that are fighting the forces of globalism.

All over the world, the forces of anti-Semitism are rising.  Even here in the United States, there are large numbers of people that are virulently anti-Israel.

Ultimately, it is a spiritual thing.  Those that hate Israel and that hate the Jewish people are being inspired by the powers of darkness, and this cancer is spreading even among those that call themselves Bible-believing Christians.

God loves all people – and this includes the Israelis and the Palestinians.  And the ultimate solution to the problems in the Middle East would be to follow God’s blueprint, but unfortunately global leaders have their own ideas, and their anti-Semitic agenda is going to end up getting an enormous amount of people killed.

Rabbi Gordis Is Wrong About President-Elect Trump and Israel - ABRAHAM H. MILLER/HAYM SALOMON CENTER CHARISMA NEWS

(Reuters photo)

Rabbi Gordis Is Wrong About President-Elect Trump and Israel

11/28/2016 ABRAHAM H. MILLER/HAYM SALOMON CENTER  CHARISMA NEWS

Whether Jews concerned about Israel agree with Daniel Gordis, they generally not only read what he has to say, but his comments also become a primary source of discussion for days after his articles appear.

This is no less true of the conservative rabbi's latest article, about Donald Trump's election victory. But this is less the voice of Gordis' usual scholarly insight and moderation, and more a page from Lamentations reminding us of his love for Israel and the "danger" that a Trump victory brings to the world's two largest Jewish communities.

Strange—living in America, I viewed the Trump victory as opening a new and glorious era for American Jews, even though most of them are too wedded to their Democratic Party identification to comprehend what the Obama administration has meant for the Jewish community.

For the last eight years, Barack Obama, the man who allegedly slept at the feet of the anti-Semitic and anti-American Rev. Jeremiah Wright and his messages of black liberation theology, has refused to have Title VI enforced by his administration on behalf of Jewish students. This has meant that while the obscenities of racism and various forms of bigotry are virulently attacked on college campuses with the full weight and power of the federal government, anti-Semitism is not. In fact, as Paul Miller has documented, anti-Semitism on college campuses has become a growth industry. And wherever there is faculty support for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel, anti-Jewish incidents are four times more likely to occur, according to Tammi Rossman-Benjamin of the AMCHA Initiative.

There are numerous reasons for this, and the Obama administration's refusal to implement Title VI to defend Jewish students against hatred is one of them. In sharp contrast, the Trump administration has announced its intention to consider BDS an act of anti-Semitism and to use the full power of the federal government to fight anti-Semitism on campus. 

So for those liberal rabbis who share Rabbi Gordis's concerns about the Trump presidency and are busy sitting shiva (the Jewish mourning ritual) with their congregants while serving warm cocoa and borrowing helper puppies from the local humane society to comfort the mourners, I want to know: Where were you when anti-Semitism was flourishing on our campuses, when Jewish students were being humiliated in class for their Zionism, and when thugs of the radical Muslim persuasion and their leftist allies—with school administration complicity—were preventing Jewish students from attending classes? I'd ask the same question of our Jewish defense organizations and most campus Hillels, but regrettably most of us who study these issues know the answers to those questions.

Gordis is unconcerned with these issues, but he is concerned with what he sees as the rise of anti-Semitism, not in the anti-Semitic thuggery on the college campus, but that the KKK is having a victory march in North Carolina. No, what troubles Gordis isn't the well-funded student associations that have made college life a living hell for some Jewish students, it's what he sees as the rise of the KKK.

Perhaps, living in Israel, Gordis is unaware that the North Carolina KKK—at the most generous estimate—numbers 200 members. North Carolina has more than 10 million people, and the Klan has two-thousandths of a percent of that number as its members. Trump can no more control (nor should he) who celebrates his victory than Hillary Clinton can control all those sheikdoms that prayed fervently for hers—although she surely could have controlled the investment they made in her foundation. What expectations did all those sheiks have for the millions they poured into the coffers of the Clinton Foundation? Was it better respect for girls and women as human beings and not as sex objects? No doubt.

Suddenly, Gordis has discovered that America's Jewish future is at stake. I thought America's Jewish future was at stake when Title VI was not being used to protect Jewish college students. I thought America's Jewish future was at stake when the anti-Semitic, cop-hating Black Lives Matter movement was invited to the White House. I thought America's Jewish future was at stake when Hillary Clinton would be called upon to pay off all those investments made by sheikdoms living in the Middle Ages. 

If Gordis is going to read from Lamentations on his forthcoming tour, he will find eager paranoid Jews who share his myopic read of America and think that the Obama administration was the golden age of tolerance for the Jewish community. He will find welcoming audiences at San Francisco's Commonwealth Club and almost anywhere on the Upper East Side of Manhattan.

But as far as those of us who are Americans first and foremost are concerned, Donald Trump is our president-elect—get over it. While Gordis is contemplating what to say to those in the Jewish community who remain in mourning, he should also give due consideration to unpacking his suitcase. He has nothing new to add except to aggravate their misery. His time might be better spent sitting across the table from the Palestinian Authority's expired-term president, Mahmoud Abbas, giving him a pencil and paper and asking him to draw the boundaries of an acceptable Palestinian state alongside a Jewish state. Now that should keep him engaged for some time, if not for eternity. 

Abraham H. Miller is a distinguished fellow with the Haym Salomon Center news and public policy group and an emeritus professor of political science, University of Cincinnati.

This article was originally published at jns.org. Used with permission.

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Anti-Semitism in the Media - Israel Today

Anti-Semitism in the Media

Wednesday, August 24, 2016 |  Israel Today Staff

Most mainstream media are markedly anti-Israel. Their oft repeated excuse, "being anti-Israel is not the same as being anti-Semitic", is a transparent politically correct attempt to cover up their anti-Semitism and hatred of the existence of the Jewish people.

We repeatedly come across, and hear of, anti-Semitic articles, television programs or talkshow participants that regularly exhibit this phenomenon.

Recently a TV documentary aired concerning the bloody West Jerusalem Har Nof synagogue terrorist attack in which praying Jews were mercilessly murdered with knives, axes and a pistol. Five lost their lives in this attack including 3 rabbis and a policeman. The documentary described the deceased as radical, racist settlers in an attempt to shift the blame of the incident attempting to whitewash the guilt of the hateful murderers.

In another documentary aired on a German TV channel, Arab children were shown undergoing military style training with the purpose of being trained to kill Israelis. The presenter immediately claimed that, "both Israeli and Arab children are 'trained to hate' and are taught to mutually despise one another!" Again this was an attempt to place the blame for the hate of Jews equally on both Arabs AND Jews!

Therefore WE NEED YOU!

Israel Today, in collaboration with you, will compile and publish a media blacklist of entities that indulge in overt anti-Semitism. If you observe and witness these activities, we invite you to send us a report of specific incidents (no more than 300 words) to info@israeltoday.co.il, and we will publish selected reports to our site.

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Today's Strange Parallels to Israel's First Passover - SANDRA TEPLINSKY/LIGHT OF ZION CHARISMA NEWS

Today's Strange Parallels to Israel's First Passover

4/12/2016 SANDRA TEPLINSKY/LIGHT OF ZION  charisma news

Anti-Semitism is as prevalent today as it was 3,500 years ago under Pharaoh in Egypt. (iStock photo )

Next week Jewish people around the world will celebrate what is likely the most beloved of the Levitical feasts, the Passover. Every year at this time—and now for 3,500 years—we have remembered and engaged with the reality of God's miraculous redemption of our nation.

From generation to generation, His story has become ours. In 2016, however, the back story to Israel's original Passover seems strangely parallel to events today.

Exodus 1 recounts that after Jacob and his sons died in Egypt, the Israelites "became exceedingly numerous, so that the land was filled with them." (v.7) The rabbis teach that the ancient Hebrews experienced supernatural fruitfulness and multiplication. But then "a new king, who did not know about Joseph, came to power in Egypt" (v.8). As we'll see momentarily, the first known instance of anti-Semitism followed.

Humankind's expression of its seemingly endless hatred of the Jewish people surfaces for the first time in Exodus 1. Now, the biblical text never suggests the Israelites did anything wrong, or in any way sought to harm the Egyptians. All they did was prosper by the blessing of YHVH. Nevertheless, listen to the words of an ancient pharaoh threatened by them for no apparent reason:

• "The Israelites have become much too numerous for us ...
• We must deal shrewdly with them or they will grow even more numerous
• ... they will join our enemies and fight against us." (v.9-10)

The pharaoh's shrewd dealing took the form of harsh slavery. Yet the more the Hebrews were cruelly abused and overworked, the more they multiplied. Therefore, as a last resort or "final solution," Egypt launched a genocidal campaign against them. Every male newborn Hebrew was drowned—until God intervened and delivered His people through very deep waters. (Because God curses those who curse Israel, the Egyptian male army drowned in the Red Sea. The Egyptians who joined with Israel in their exodus journey, He blessed.)

This insight into Passover's back story can help us stand firm against the rise of global anti-Semitism today. A world leader 3,500 years ago came to power who did not know about Joseph. It seems the history of this leader's nation was not especially important to him. As a result, he lacked an historical context with which to judge events taking place in his day. Without this context, the pharaoh elevated his subjective emotional perceptions of what was right or wrong to the level of objective truth. Proud and deceived, he acted out irrationally in that spirit.

When nations dismiss objective fact and moral truth, deception results. Anti-Semitism typically flares up. Through history, the Jewish nation has been targeted as a scapegoat for the ills of a threatened and angry society. Those ills are usually due, however, to that society's own disobedience to God. Sadly, this phenomenon is occurring in much of the world today. Consequently, many do not know (or care) about "Joseph" and his God.

They do not know historical and moral truth about Israel; they do not know Christian history; they do not know YHVH. You and I have a responsibility to reach and teach them, in love. And, to never give up!

The traditional Passover liturgy urges us all to engage with the ancient exodus as if it were our own. Next week, from one generation to the next, we will pass down the story of Joseph and his God. Then, by His grace, we will continue throughout the year to teach others the ways of Yahweh.

Together, let's complete the task to which we've been called. For redemption is coming. May all Israel soon be saved! 

Sandra Teplinsky has been in Messianic Jewish ministry since 1979. She is president and founder of Light of Zion, a Messianic outreach to Israel and the church based in California and Jerusalem.

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Was Obama’s Claim Israel is Root of Mideast Conflict Prophesied by Ezekiel? - BREAKING ISRAEL NEWS

Was Obama’s Claim Israel is Root of Mideast Conflict Prophesied by Ezekiel?

By Adam Eliyahu Berkowitz April 8, 2016 BREAKING ISRAEL NEWS

“When he is judged, let him go forth condemned; and let his prayer be turned into sin. Let his days be few; let another take his charge.” Psalms 109:7-8 (The Israel Bible™)

Last month, US President Barack Obama laid the blame for failed Middle East peace initiatives on the economic success of the Jewish State, saying, “Because Israeli society has been so successful economically, it has I think from a position of strength been less willing to make concessions.”

Speaking to a Young Leaders of the Americas Initiative at a town hall meeting in Buenos Aires, Argentina, last month, Obama explained why the phenomenon of Israel’s prosperity was the greatest obstacle to negotiations between Palestinians and Israel.

“If [Prime Minister] Netanyahu wants peace, he’s got to make concessions to create a Palestinian state.  But he has to get elected, and he’s thinking to himself, if I make this concession, then somebody in my party, the Likud, may challenge me,” he said.

The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) called the statement “an absurd anti-Semitic canard – which dangerously (and falsely) implies that ‘peace’ will ensue if the U.S. weakens Israel economically”. The ZOA suggested this was the strategy behind several recent Obama administration policies, giving as examples the US’s issuing of an anti-Israel labeling requirement in January and Obama’s attack against a pro-Israel section of a bipartisan trade bill in February.

Countering his own logic in the same speech in Buenos Aires, Obama claimed that economic weakness necessary for the Israelis to make progress in the negotiations was an obstacle for the Palestinians.

“The Palestinians, because of [economic] weakness, have not the political cohesion and organization to enter into negotiations and feel like they can get what they need,” the president said.

Obama’s comments were foreseen by the sages of Torah as part of the Messianic process.

In his prophecy about the days preceding the War of Gog and Magog, Ezekiel predicted that enemies would rise up against Israel’s after their return from the diaspora, attacking them for their economic success.

To take the spoil and to take the prey; to turn thy hand against the waste places that are now inhabited and against the people that are gathered out of the nations that have gotten cattle and goods that dwell in the middle of the earth.  Ezekiel 38:12

The Malbim, Meïr Leibush ben Yehiel Michel Wisser, a Torah scholar from the 19th century, explained this verse.

“Every one (of the inhabitants of the Land of Israel) will become a trader, trading there until it multiplies greatly, until they are sitting on the middle (umbilical cord) of the land and become the commercial hub of all nations, until the other nations come to them to cancel this trade which they claim is damaging to the world.”

In a global economy, each country’s success is dependant on having strong partners. The Malbim noted correctly that other nations attacking Israel for its financial prowess is like a fetus in the womb attacking the umbilical cord that connects it to the source of its sustenance.