Why should we like Israel? What have they done for us? How often do you hear them do something for the USA? When is the last time we got anything from them? I keep hearing how they give us "intelligence" but any time we do something in the middle east the intelligence is always said to come from Saudi Arabia or something instead.
Seriously, what does Israel do for the US?
Seriously, a better question might be what does Israel do for the World?
- Invented drip irrigation technology to allow for crop growth in water constrained areas. Technology employed in the US, Africa, and Australia.
- World leader in thermal desalination technology with plants built in 40+ countries
- World leader in agricultural biotechnology; created pathogen resistant bananas and high yield cotton crops that grow in hostile environments
- World leader in solar technology. The Mojave desert solar plant was built by an Israeli company
- Numerous defense technologies, including the Iron Dome system that is now being shared with the US
- Teva pharmaceuticals is one of the world's largest producers of antibiotics and medications
- Israel is the world leader in government sponsored marijuana research for potential medical use
- Highest per capita rate of scientific publications and patents in the world
- Miniaturized pill sized medical camera technology used for internal medicine diagnostics
- Invented robotic technology to assist paraplegics in walking
- USB thumb drives, most of the Windows NT operating system, cell phone components all invented in Israel
- Intel Core Duo and Duo2 technology (code named Yonah and Merom) developed in Israel
- ICQ, voicemail, and checkpoint firewall were/are all Israeli technologies/companies
The complete list of medical and technological accomplishments is actually far more expansive than the small list above. Pretty good for a country the size of New Jersey with a population of 8 million surrounded by people that want to kill them. Comparatively, I'd love to see the list of modern day accomplishments of the 17 arab states combined, with 47X the population and 545X the land mass of Israel. Oh yeah, and practically unlimited funding to research/develop whatever they want via their abundant supply of oil..
No worries though, as soon as the land is given to the Palestinians, I am sure they'll put down their weapons and get crackin' on that cure for cancer.