ABSTRACT
The secret diplomatic track helps in each of the four clusters of national interests: security, trade, the Jewish agenda, and political relations. Israel, itself traditionally a major consumer of arms imports, for many years has quietly executed a unique program of its own of providing military aid to developing Third World countries. Military assistance can easily shade into a third security-related area of quiet Israeli diplomacy–intelligence. The image of Israel as resourceful in the area of foreign commerce is by no means limited to securing strategic raw materials and oil reserves. Israeli policymakers have for long realized that, at least for the present era, the Zionist dream of a massive "ingathering of the exiles" is beyond practical reach. International activity on behalf of troubled Jewish communities inevitably poses a question within Jewish circles as to the best and most effective tactics or course of action.
