It Is Measured by the Ability to Defend Yourself In recent weeks Europe has been filled with dramatic talk about "breaking away" from the United States in response to Donald Trump's policies. Closed-door meetings strong public statements and bold headlines have created the impression that the transatlantic alliance is on the verge of collapse. The reality is much simpler. Europe is not really seeking independence from the United States. It is trying to preserve the old order. For decades European governments built generous welfare states under the protection of the American security umbrella. While Washington spent trillions of dollars on military forces overseas bases intelligence capabilities and nuclear deterrence European governments were able to devote far more of their own budgets to social programs public services and expanding the welfare state. Now Trump is asking Europe to change that equation. His message is straightforward. If Europe wants to be a true strategic partner it must carry a much larger share of its own defense burden. That is not an extreme demand. It is a demand for responsibility. It is a demand for genuine independence. The same logic applies to economics. For years Europe enjoyed large trade surpluses with the United States while America continued to shoulder much of the cost of defending the Western world. Trump argues that such an arrangement cannot continue forever. Beyond the political arguments lies a more fundamental question. Can an alliance remain healthy over the long term when one partner pays for much of the collective security while the other continually criticizes it and at times even portrays it as part of the problem? At the same time Europe is facing a series of serious internal challenges. Illegal immigration continues to strain many countries. The population is aging rapidly. Energy costs remain high. Economic growth has slowed. And the military capabilities of many European nations have steadily eroded. All of these trends deepen Europe's dependence on the United States and make it even harder to replace American military economic and technological power.

For decades the West told itself a comforting story. If China were welcomed into the global economy and given access to investment, technology, manufacturing and international markets it would eventually become more democratic and more liberal. Trade would soften ideology and prosperity would naturally lead to freedom. I believe this was one of the greatest strategic mistakes the West has made since the end of the Cold War. The mistake was assuming that every nation views the world through the same liberal lens. Western leaders believed that economic development would inevitably produce political openness. China's leadership never shared that assumption. For Beijing economic growth was never a path to liberal democracy. It was a tool for building national power. Anyone familiar with the history of Communist China should have questioned this belief from the beginning. Mao Zedong presided over one of the most brutal regimes in human history. His economic policies triggered catastrophic famine that killed tens of millions of people. Millions more were persecuted during the Cultural Revolution while the Communist Party built a system of almost total control over society. This was never a temporary deviation. It was part of the regime's political DNA. When Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger opened the door to China in the 1970s there was a clear strategic logic behind the decision. The goal was to exploit the growing split between China and the Soviet Union and weaken Moscow. It was a balance of power strategy rather than an ideological partnership. Over time however American thinking changed. Instead of viewing China as a temporary strategic partner against the Soviet Union many policymakers began to believe it would eventually become a natural member of the liberal international order. That was where the illusion truly began. The West transferred massive industrial capacity to China. It shared advanced technology academic knowledge investment capital and entire manufacturing supply chains. It opened global markets supported China's entry into the World Trade Organization and provided access to unprecedented levels of Western capital.

In this lecture attorney David Peter argues that the structure of Israeli democracy has gradually changed and that real decision-making power has shifted from the public and its elected representatives to the judiciary. According to him most political debates in Israel focus on what the right decision is while ignoring the more fundamental question of who has the authority to make that decision. He begins by explaining that every society is built on rules and that the central political question has always been who gets to write those rules. He describes the rise of modern democracy as a reaction to monarchy where sovereignty was transferred from the king to the people. In this model the people are the ultimate source of political authority and government exists to carry out their will. Peter argues that in a classical democracy courts are meant to protect the legal framework created by the people rather than replace it with their own judgment. Administrative decisions must follow the law and if a constitution exists then the law itself must follow the constitution. The role of judges is to enforce those rules not to decide what public policy should be. According to Peter Israel began moving away from that model in the 1980s and especially after what became known as the Constitutional Revolution of the 1990s. He argues that the Supreme Court gradually expanded its authority by using legal concepts such as reasonableness and later by treating Israel's Basic Laws as a constitution. In his view this allowed judges to overturn government decisions not because they violated the law but because the judges believed different decisions were preferable. He explains Hans Kelsen's theory of the normative hierarchy where every level of government is bound by a higher legal authority. Peter argues that this hierarchy was fundamentally changed in Israel when the courts gave themselves the power to interpret the Basic Laws as constitutional authority and to strike down legislation based on that interpretation.