When I was a youth (and a Christian), I shared the common American perception of Israel as a state created to be a homeland for Jews in general and thus worth defending at all costs, since Jews throughout history have been subjected to discrimination and even atrocities, including the Holocaust of World War II. When Israel was first founded in 1948, it was immediately attacked by its Arab neighbors, something I still consider to be one of the dumbest things the Arabs could have done since it made them look no better than the Nazis. Israel not only won that war, but then fought three more wars against its Arab neighbors in the 20th Century, until finally two of these countries, Egypt and Jordan, gave up and signed peace treaties with Israel. That should have ended all Israel’s problems and led to peace for good. But it didn’t!

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