HAPPY BIRTHDAY: PLENTY TO CELEBRATE

Plenty to Celebrate - Editorial
Ben-Gurion, whose original state contained a mere 600,000 Jews, would have hardly believed that in his own children's lives, this number would grow almost tenfold. He certainly would have been stunned to learn that Zion is only a few years from becoming home to the world's largest Jewish community, a status it has not had since the First Temple's destruction nearly two-and-a-half millennia ago. Israel's per-capita income is higher than half the European Union's, and the Jewish state has one of the world's most solid currencies and most envied technological industries.

Demographically, while most other Western populations are shrinking, Israel's continues to grow, thanks to fertility rates that are higher, and marriage ages and divorce rates that are lower, than most other countries in the West. Most importantly, in a world where organic culture is often being overpowered by international commercializing forces, in Israel, Hebrew language and culture - which only a century ago hardly existed - are flourishing. (Jerusalem Post)

57 reasons why I love Israel
On Israel's 57th birthday, a Jerusalem Post columnist offers 57 reasons why she loves the Jewish state. (Jerusalem Post)

Israel at 57 - Gil Troy
What should be one of the Western world's great success stories is frequently treated as a pariah state. A democracy with a rollicking political culture, a fertile arts scene, a sophisticated economy, a tremendous infrastructure, a cutting edge scientific community, a young, growing, multicultural, multiracial, and multilingual population, is frequently caricatured as a fragile, dysfunctional, garrison state teetering on the edge of collapse. By any objective standards, Israel is thriving. The high-tech sector has bounced back and the economy is beginning to soar again. Israel won its first Olympic gold medal last summer, and just months later won its first Nobel Prize in science for chemists who discovered cancer-busting proteins.

Israel won the ugly war Arafat and the Palestinians unleashed in 2000. Israel has proved democracies can defeat terror with a combination of effective fences, aggressive policing, active soldiering, vigilant citizens, and creative leadership. Given what Israel has endured, given the quality of life of so many of its citizens, given the many life-changing pharmaceutical, medicinal, and technological wonders emanating from there, given the symphonies and universities, the newspapers and bookstores, the full cafes and the booming businesses, the delicious mix of old traditions and new ideas, and the warm, effusive citizenry, it remains one of the 21st century's great hopes. The writer teaches history at McGill University. (Montreal Gazette/United Jerusalem)