Examining the various effects that COVID-19 might have on the Jewish state’s security, Efraim Inbar expresses his concerns about the logistical and economic strains the disease will likely put on the IDF. Militaries, moreover, depend on soldiers acting in unison in ways that are difficult to do while adhering to the social-distancing measures that can counteract the spread of contagion. As for the argument that Israel’s foes suffer from the epidemic as well, and may be less prepared to counter it—Inbar is not reassured:

The virus obviously does not affect enemy motivations to destroy the Jewish state. The proliferation of conspiracy theories holding Jews responsible for the coronavirus only intensifies such motivation. Poverty and sickness among Israel’s neighbors usually lead to the recruitment of desperate people for suicide bombings.

The assertion that the virus diverts enemy attention from the conflict with Israel and tempers the behavior of Israel’s enemies is, alas, wishful thinking; mainly of incorrigible optimists who have difficulty understanding the Middle Eastern mind. Iran continues its campaign to evict America from Iraq and its support of the Houthis in Yemen—despite the deadly results of the epidemic in Iran. Turkey continues its struggle to control Idlib. Its real constraint is Russian ambitions, not the coronavirus. Nor is there any evidence of moderation in Bashar al-Assad’s behavior.

National cohesion is a prerequisite for winning war, [however], and Israeli society is evincing outstanding national cohesion at present. Therefore, Israel has a decent chance at winning the war against the coronavirus.

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.