An Israeli organization called MIND Israel brought together 100 experts to explore fundamental questions concerning Israel's future, the course it should take, the future of Israeli society, and what lies ahead for the country.
This newspaper published a summary of the organization's report and the foundations it examined. Avner Golov, the organization's vice president, said: "If we do not address these foundations, we will not only lose our status as a superpower, but the entire structure will collapse."
The experts identified six critical issues requiring urgent decisions. The organization's president, retired Major General Amos Yadlin, said they intend to present them to the public. He identified them as "Israel's regional standing, the quality of its human capital, the relationship between the economy and security, governance and national resilience, demographic changes in the country, and relations between us and the United States."
Golov introduced the study by saying: "We reviewed the literature and found that civilizations do not disappear because of external forces; they commit suicide. No civilization has been conquered from outside while it was strong. Rather, internal dynamics emerge that dismantle it. More than once, something comes from outside that serves as the final nail in its coffin. The formula for the destruction of a civilization includes the erosion of social cohesion, damage to trust in state institutions, the prioritization of short-term political gains over long-term national interests, and intellectual rigidity that makes adaptation difficult."
For me, it is important to understand the dynamics of thinking and action within the Israeli mind, even when we are at war, politically or militarily, with Israel. This is a mind that belongs to all of Israel, not to a particular party or political figure.
Israel is a state at the heart of our geography, and what its thinkers examine and conclude about its civilizational and political future clearly concerns us directly.
But that is not the only reason to draw attention to this report, this organization, and this group of experts. There is another question: does the same idea, the same approach, have counterparts in our Arab countries?
Do we have an institution like MIND Israel in the Arab world?
Institutions that bring experts together, where accumulated experience and mature minds meet young, eager spirits in a single vessel, to examine a single question: What comes next?
We have enlightened minds and pure spirits concerned with the public good. They are not "tactical," opportunistic, superficial, or hasty minds, but minds and spirits that look toward the highest level of abstraction: the nation and the national interest, the highest summit around which everything else revolves.
In Morocco, for example, the great Moroccan thinker and historian Abdallah Laroui was among the most valuable, profound, and sincere figures to help shape Morocco's national identity and establish it on multiple pillars, including language, religion, and geography.
Yet Arab media devote a great deal of attention to Israel's military, intelligence, and technological power, as well as to American support. Very few, however, pay attention to this dimension of Israeli power: the mind.
