Letters to the Editor
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The new crusades will end up much like the old
The history of the Middle East on a thumbnail.
The Middle East historically was the home to a respectable number of Arab (Semite) tribes. These tribes spent a fair amount of time running around trying to kick the ass of the other tribes and create petty (meaning relatively small) kingdoms. One bunch of these Arab tribes, calling themselves Jews, were doing the same thing. Like their neighbors the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Sumerians, etc etc, they created a tin-pot kingdom that alternatively flourished and was conquered.
Then the big, bad Romans came in and kicked everybody's ass for good and sucked most of the area up in their empire. From its zenith, this empire spent around 1200 years breaking up and slowly collapsing. In the middle of all this, a new religion arose, called Islam, that started creating its own empire based on religion (as opposed to tribal affiliation). The Holy Roman Empire (originally called the Eastern Roman Empire) slowly contracted over several hundred years under the onslaught of Islam.
Around the last millennium, the Christian kingdoms of Europe got it in their heads that they should be running the Levant (as it was then called) since it was the birthplace of their religion (as opposed to today where Jewish replaces Christian in the birthplace thingy). They mounted the Crusades which put the coup de grace to the Holy Roman Empire and established a couple of European/Christian kingdoms that lasted a century or so before being overwhelmed by the local populace.
Fast forward 1000 years and we find a bunch of European Jews this time getting it in their heads that they should be running the Levant since that was their ancestral homeland. The fact that they haven't lived there for two millennia is a mere fillip. So, like their Christian progenitors of a millennium before, they have carved out a small kingdom that is a foreign graft on the indigenous population. Since it is a foreign graft imposed on the indigenous population, it will probably last as long as the Christian kingdoms did.
The only question is: Which empire will be getting the coup de grace? The answer to that question is left as an exercise for the student.