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Jerusalem, Israel

The memo sat on Judah Navon’s desk for nearly three days. Navon would glance over in its direction at odd times during the day. He wondered about the author who would craft such a memo. Who was Abe Zeffren, anyway?

Israel’s prime minister was a careful, thoughtful steward of Israel’s heritage, its place in history, and its path forward.

The country had faced one challenge to its survival after another over the years—the Six-Day War, the constant threats from neighbors near and far, and the threat of nuclear annihilation from Iran’s Shi’a theocracy.

Israel’s citizens lived daily with the reminder that life was short, and that you’d better be passionate about your reason for walking the planet and your place on it.

Nearly every person Navon encountered during his daily political life in Israel demanded that he defend and protect its right to exist in the face of constant threats to wipe it off the face of the earth.

But after a generation of struggles, Israel was about to turn a corner for the first time in its history. Many of the same enemies that had fought against Israel early in its history had gone through regime changes in recent years. Still others were caught up in the Arab Spring revolts and had turned their attention inward.

Israel was no longer at the top of their list of concerns.

Meanwhile, bitter enemies like Iran were actively pursuing peace with them. A solution to the intractable Palestinian homeland problem was seemingly just over the horizon. And Israel’s woeful, constant search for energy appeared to be poised for a miraculous reversal of fortunes.

Which is precisely why Abe Zeffren’s memo troubled Navon so, and why Zeffren was waiting patiently in the outer office.

Navon had glanced casually at the deputy oil commissioner’s occasional memos over the years. None had ever been out of the ordinary—just reports on the comings and goings of various efforts to keep Israel from becoming too dependent on any one source of energy.

But this memo from the deputy oil commissioner was different. At its conclusion, Zeffren had asked to meet with him privately to discuss it.

Do not sign an agreement with Russia to finance oil exploration, Abe had written at the end. If you do, it will mean the end of Israel. We will lose control of our own destiny.

But Zeffren had condemned the American efforts just as harshly:

The refinery in the Negev, coupled with their earth-moving and peacekeeping efforts at Beersheba, is the proverbial nose under the camel’s tent. We should never have allowed them to embed themselves so deeply in the affairs of our national economy. For now, I fear, they will never leave.

All that was left, the deputy oil commissioner had written, was for China to show up at Israel’s door and demand a seat at the table. At that point, all three of the world’s most dangerous superpowers would be working and operating deeply inside Israel’s borders.

Once that had occurred, he’d written, Israel no longer controlled its destiny. Any one of those three economic and military superpowers could decide to wage war against each other over one dispute or another in the Middle East—and Israel would likely be squarely in the crosshairs of the dispute.

Navon had to wonder at Zeffren’s prescience on the China guess. China had, in fact, just approached Israel to supply nearly half of its oil and gas. Some would come from Eastern Europe, with the balance made from oil obtained at Shfela in partnership with both the Americans and the Russians. His foreign minister presently was negotiating with the Chinese on the terms.

Navon buzzed his assistant. “Can you send the deputy oil commissioner in? I can see him now. But I only have a few minutes.”

“I believe that’s all he requires,” the assistant said.

Abe had seen the prime minister in public on occasion. He’d never met him, but Abe had always hoped for a chance to at least speak to him. He wasn’t nervous. Mostly, he wanted to say his piece and leave.

“Prime Minister, thank you for agreeing to see me,” Abe said as he came through the door and took one of the two chairs in front of the desk.

“My pleasure,” Navon said. “I enjoyed your memo. It was…”

“Provocative?”

“Yes, that’s as good a word as any,” Navon said. “And do you believe it, what you wrote?”

Abe nodded. “I do, with every ounce of conviction that I can convey. I asked to see you because I wanted to make a simple request. Israel has never relied on anyone else—not the Americans, not the Soviets once upon a time, not the Chinese—for its destiny. Please don’t tie our country to those countries through these arrangements.”

“You do realize that this is highly unorthodox for a bureaucrat to make such a plea? Your job is to provide background, not necessarily to offer advice,” Navon said evenly.

“I understand. But I’ve been in my job for a considerable amount of time. We’ve always managed to make do with the meager natural resources at our disposal. Now, in a very short period of time, the world’s superpowers show up with offers of riches and gold? Why would we agree to tie our future to theirs?”

“Because it offers us energy independence, for one,” Navon said. “And because it gives us resources we might not otherwise have at our disposal. It gives us options.”

“Prime Minister, I beg to differ, but it does not give us options,” Abe said forcefully. “It binds us to them. And like an oxen team that pulls unevenly, we’re likely to veer off course when one pulls harder than the other.”

“So you’re comparing us to oxen?”

“If the analogy works, yes. I cannot emphasize this strongly enough. We don’t need America, Russia, or China involved in our own economic affairs.”

“And how would you develop the Shfela oil reserves or the natural gas finds off the coast of Haifa?” Navon asked.

“We’ll find a way,” Abe said. “We always have.”

“And if I tell you that the die has already been cast—that we must find a way to work with America, Russia, and China in our land and our national economy, what would you say to that?”

“I would say that Israel had better prepare for a coming storm,” Abe said. “With great power come great expectations and inevitable conflict. Those three have a considerable amount of power. Now they will be wielding it within our borders and entangling Israel in their affairs.”