Matrix....I think we needed Israel as a hedge first against the Soviets. The Muslim extremist thing played second fiddle tp "Pan arabism" in the 50's-70's. Once the Israelis' proved they could kick the living dog shit out of any Arab army, that idea died and those countries either just delt with Israel of had their own issues to deal with. Then u had the war in Lebanon which really stirred up the islamist terror factor. Many of the arabs states adopted the Palastinians as a proxy cause/army to do their dirty work. These people realy don't like them to begin with but as a casue to support, in order to destabilize the Jews, they will back em whole heartedly. Now we have no Soviet Union but the threat of Terror in that reason. The Israeli's face the same threat. We're not just going to back off. Unless the Arabs as a whole came to us and said we'll sell u all the oil u want as 50 per barrel and give up all terror attacks, nukes, everthing etc...just give up military support to israel, I don' think we're going anywhere soon. It would be in our stategic best interest to do so if we could trust the Arabs if that were the case. Since we can't, and Israel serves as a hedge against other problem states in the region, we will continue to back them.
