ABSTRACT
Israeli democracy celebrates its 40th anniversary in 1988. Israelis tended to be confident that the guardian of Israel would prevail. Although this guardian had various identities, the core belief was in its potency. This is the basic feature of the way Israelis looked at the world. Most of the political points of view on the Israeli scene in the 1980s seemed to stem from the same basic orientation toward the world. The national preoccupation with security — even on the part of those who feel more or less secure and on the part of those who attribute more or less peaceful aspirations to the Arabs — is the over-arching principle at the base of the Israeli consensus. In a sense this task is easier for the Israeli leadership since the public is aware of the importance of the issue and is relatively well-informed.
