Israeli archaeologists have unearthed a 23-foot-long tunnel carved from basalt underneath the historic part of the city of Tiberias on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. They believe it was constructed by 12th-century European Christians. Yori Yalon writes:

“The tunnel we discovered may very likely have been a secret passage leading to the harbor of Tiberias, which we know about from Crusader historical sources,” said Joppe Gosker, who directs the excavation on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority. Gosker said the sources “describe the siege imposed by the Muslim ruler Saladin on the citadel in July 1187, in which Princess Eschiva, wife of the knight Raymond of Tripoli, was confined.”

“We know from the sources that Raymond directed his wife to escape to the harbor and board a ship where she would stay until he came to rescue her,” Gosker said. “It seems that the tunnel we revealed led from the citadel to the sea, and probably provided a safe route for a maritime escape in times of danger.” . . . The [fighting near] Tiberias led to the Battle of Hattin on July 4, 1187, in which Saladin’s army defeated the Crusader kingdom.

Two extraordinary events demonstrate something important about Israel’s most fervent adversaries. One was a speech given at something called The People’s Forum (funded generously by Goldman Sachs), which stated, “When the state of Israel is finally destroyed and erased from history, that will be the single most important blow we can give to destroying capitalism and imperialism.”

The suggestion that this tiny state is the linchpin of a global, centuries-old phenomenon like capitalism goes well beyond anything resembling rational criticism. Even if Israel were guilty of genocide, apartheid, and oppression—which of course it is not—it would not follow that its destruction would help end capitalism or imperialism.

The other was an anti-Israel protest that took place in front of New York City’s Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, deemed “complicit” in Israel’s evils. At organizers’ urging, participants shouted their slogans at kids in the cancer ward, who were watching from the windows. Given Hamas’s indifference toward the lives of Gazan children, such callousness toward non-Palestinian children from Hamas’s Western allies shouldn’t be surprising. The protest—like the abovementioned speech—deliberately conveyed the message that Israel is the ultimate evil and its destruction the ultimate good, cancer patients be damned.

The fact that Israel’s adversaries are almost comically perverse does not mean that they can be dismissed. If its allies fail to understand the obsessive and irrational hatred that it faces, they cannot effectively help it defend itself.