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Source: http://blogs.cfr.org/cook/2016/05/31/on-the-road-in-israel/
Israel Is Not the Cause of the Middle East's Problems
(Council on Foreign Relations) Steven A. Cook - The debates that occupy us in the West about Israel, its conflict with the Palestinians, and the country's role in the world seem divorced from reality when confronted with the actual experience of contemporary Israel. For as long as anyone can remember, Israelis have been arguing that the conflict with the Palestinians is not the cause of the Middle East's various problems. But the world insisted on "linkage" - after Operation Desert Storm in 1991, there was a big push to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Now, with Syria consumed by violence, Iraq struggling with the political forces that have been pulling it apart since the U.S. invasion in 2003, Yemen failing, Libya fragmenting, and Egypt lurching from crisis to crisis, the Israelis say, "You see, none of this has anything to do with us or the Palestinians." They are correct. The writer is a Senior Fellow for Middle East and Africa Studies at CFR.