DBWI: Middle Eastern Israel?

Israel's alliance with the USSR.
Well, it ended up becoming less an alliance and more a satellite-state arrangement... but fair point anyway.

The Sandman said:
OOC: Given that the divergence is post-WWII, the official language of any Israel, regardless of where it is, probably won't be Yiddish. You do recall that one of the effects of the Holocaust was the obliteration of the vast majority of the European speakers of Yiddish?
(OOC: Well, there were still a few million Yiddish speakers alive at the end of the war... and maybe in TTL the Yiddish-as-official-language thing was because of the greater Soviet influence over Israel. So there'd still be lots of Hebrew speakers at the formation of the nation, but Yiddish ended up becoming dominant. Does that work?)
 
If there's an Israel in the Middle East, wouldn't that cover up the International Peace Territory? Then who would protect the Druze?

Chances are the International Peace Territory (Centered around Beirut) would be further north than any Jewish state in the region. Who would have expected that the Maronites would find allies and partners in the Druze?
 

Hashasheen

Banned
Chances are the International Peace Territory (Centered around Beirut) would be further north than any Jewish state in the region. Who would have expected that the Maronites would find allies and partners in the Druze?
especially after killing them for so long.:rolleyes:
 

Keenir

Banned
OOC: Given that the divergence is post-WWII, the official language of any Israel, regardless of where it is, probably won't be Yiddish. You do recall that one of the effects of the Holocaust was the obliteration of the vast majority of the European speakers of Yiddish?

OOC: but that did not exterminate Yiddish as pretty much a global(ly-understood) language; Canadian Jews of European extraction could use Yiddish to speak to Chinese Jews. Consider that OTL Israel had the Brigade for the Defense of the Language not for use against Arabic, but so that Yiddish wouldn't be so influential.

reference: Spoken Here: Travels among the World's threatened languages.
 
(OOC: Sorry about the multiple posts :()

Although you know, you raise an interesting point. We think of Zionism generally as such a leftist, socialistic sort of movement, given its roots in socialism and Israel's alliance with the USSR. But there was always that undercurrent of "Holy Land" Zionism in certain evangelical circles in the USA - the same circles that allied themselves so strongly with Republican Party conservatives from the 1960s or so. It's likely that a Middle Eastern Israel would have had close ties with the West, especially with conservatives in the US. It would play a very different role in foreign policy discussions over the decades. Even today, most conservatives in the USA tend to distrust Israel, even though it's no more Communist than Russia anymore. They just never had any dramatic overthrow of the regime; it was done through gradual reforms.
Well according to the Center for a New American Century, they say, "The presence of a Judeo-Christian state, and especially one based on democratic principles can only serve to help spread democracy to the Middle East. Not only are we protecting our religious roots and heritage with this endeavor, we are insuring a beacon of liberty against the totalitarian dictatorships and monarchies that serve control the vital energy it needs in order to maintain national security..."

Apparently presidential contenders Mitt Romney (R-MA), Alan Keyes (R-IL), and Mike Huckabee (R-AR) have openly said that they believe a "Holy Republic of Zion" is in the country's best interests....
 
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