This has been a theme since 1948.
The June 23, 1948 Palestine Post has two articles that discuss how Arab claims on the weakness of the new Jewish state spread quickly, even to the West, and how they were all baseless.
The first comes from an Australian reporter, Douglas Brass. Note that this was written during the first cease fire of the 1948 war (a cease fire that was repeatedly violated by Egypt and Syrian troops.)
The other was in a report from Dorothy Bar Adon, who was a very amusing columnist for the newspaper:
The irony is that the sources for the modern versions of "Israel is weak:" comes from Israelis who are sounding alarms for potential issues to be addressed by Israeli society. In other words, the self-criticisms that show the strength of Israeli society are seen by Arabs who have no such concept as evidence of weakness.