Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel Initiative”
August 28, 2024

Western conventional wisdom is systematically baffled by the volcanic, violent, intolerant, unpredictable, despotic and frustrating Middle East reality, as evidenced by Western misperceptions of the Israel-Hamas war, which undermines the national and homeland security of the US.

For example:

*The State Department’s pressure on Israel to switch from the military option toward Hamas to the diplomatic/negotiation option, ignores the failure of the US diplomatic option toward Iran’s Ayatollahs, and the on-again, off-again Israeli diplomatic option toward Hamas since 2007 (the latest was in May 2023), which dramatically upgraded Hamas’ terror capabilities, paving the road to the horrific October 7, 2023 Hamas terrorism.  Moreover, Hamas is a branch of the Moslem Brotherhood and a proxy of Iran’s Ayatollahs, which are dedicated to the toppling of the regimes of all pro-US Arab countries and bring the Western “infidel,” and particularly “The Great American Satan” to submission.

*Thus, snatching Hamas from the jaws of obliteration would reflect a State Department and Israeli determination to repeat – rather than avoid – past critical mistakes. In the Middle East, it would be perceived as a major Islamic terrorism victory, undermining the US’ and Israel’s posture of deterrence, promoting more anti-US terrorism in the Middle Est and on US soil. This would intensify terrorism against the pro-US Arab regimes (which feel the Moslem Brotherhood machete at their throats) and against Israel, and cause a major setback to the Arab-Israeli peace process (which has been induced, mostly, by Israeli’s posture of deterrence, which was devastated on October 7).

*Israel is not fighting a Hamas terror organization, but the most fortified aboveground and underground Hamas terrorist state with an elaborate network of 60-80-feet-deep tunnels, equipped with the most advanced electronics, accommodating heavy vehicles and is longer than the NYC Subway system!

*The toll of Hamas atrocities on October 7, 2023 – 1,200 mutilated Israelis – does not fully convey the magnitude of Hamas terrorism. In proportion to the size of the US population (345 million), it was identical to 41,500 American fatalities, or 14 “nine-elevens” committed by terrorists, dispatched by a neighboring country. How would the US react to such a neighbor?!

*The number of Arab casualties in Gaza are issued by Hamas and Gaza-based branches of international organizations, who are controlled by Hamas, which is known for its horrific violation of human rights, hate education, despotism, ruthlessness and corruption. However, in the pursuit of the immoral “moral equivalence,” Western policy makers and public opinion molders reverberate Hamas’ numbers….

*Are most Gazans innocent civilians?  Hitler’s Mein Kampf has been a best seller in the Palestinian Authority since its establishment in 1993, including in Gaza. The Gaza population has considered “September 11” as a role model of Islamic heroism. Since 1994, Gaza parents have sent their children to hate-education-school – which have been the most effective production line of terrorists – while worshipping in hate-sermon-mosques, cheering and heralding daily acts of terrorism, and enticing their children to join the ranks of Hamas and other Palestinian terror organizations.

*As expected, Western and Israeli humanitarian aid to Gaza is controlled by Hamas terrorists, bolstering their terror capabilities; thus, dehumanizing the aid. Genuine humanitarian aid would be extended by the obliteration of Hamas’ terror capabilities, which could set Gaza on a humanitarian path.

*While Hamas considers its October 7 terror offensive as a divine mission to annihilate the “infidel” Jewish State, the State Department takes lightly the centrality of fanatic Islamic visions in the conduct of Middle East rogue entities. Foggy Bottom believes that terrorism is despair-driven and assumes that financial (“money talks”) and diplomatic bonanzas could induce moderation. However, Iran’s Ayatollahs, Hezbollah and Hamas interpret Western and Israeli gestures as weakness, which whets their terroristic appetite. They have demonstrated that fanatic Islamic ideology transcends financial considerations, and eclipses accords concluded with the “infidel.” They have diverted mega billions of dollars in Western gestures toward anti-Western terrorism, not moderated policy.

*Western policy makers have showered rogue Middle East entities with diplomatic and financial gestures, ignoring the precedents, which demonstrate that terrorists bite the hand that feeds them, as experienced by the US, which facilitated the rise to power of the Ayatollahs in Iran 1978/79 and the Mujahideen in Afghanistan (1980s). These terror entities emerged as chief anti-US terrorists, partaking in “September 11” and the bombings of the US Embassies in Lebanon (1983), Kenya and Tanzania (1998), as well as the Marines barracks in Lebanon (1983). Similarly, in 1993 and 2005, Israel overwhelmed the Middle East with dramatic gestures (never contemplated by Arabs) extended to the PLO, which yielded unprecedented waves of terrorism, as was demonstrated by the 2007-2023 series of Israeli financial and humanitarian gestures to Hamas, which resulted in thousands of missiles hitting Israeli civilian targets, and leading to the October 7, 2023 massacre.

*Israel’s wars on Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists are not only Israel’s wars.  These wars are largely designed, directed, supervised and financed by Iran’s Ayatollahs. The Ayatollahs’ strategic footprint stretches from the Persian Gulf through the Middle East at-large and Africa to Latin America – viewed as the US’ soft underbelly – and on US soil, as recently testified by FBI Director, Chris Wray. The Ayatollahs view Israel as the most effective US outpost/beachhead in the Middle East, and the first line of defense of the Western democracies against Shiite (Iran’s Ayatollahs) and Sunni (the Moslem Brotherhood and ISIS) Islamic terrorism.

*A nuclear Iran is not the only real and clear threat to global stability. In fact, the most pressing threat to global stability and vital US interests is Iran’s conventional military potency, which has its machete at the throats of every pro-US Arab regime, while constituting the global epicenter of anti-US terrorism, drug trafficking, money laundering and proliferation of weapon systems, They are training terrorists in the tri-border areas of Argentina-Paraguay-Brazil and Chile-Bolivia-Peru, and supplying underground tunnel construction equipment and predator unmanned aerial vehicles to Venezuela and to Mexican drug cartels.

*The 45-year-old US diplomatic option – and its bonus of hundreds of billions of dollars – failed to entice the Ayatollahs toward peaceful-coexistence, good faith negotiation and abandoning a fanatical ideology. In fact, the diplomatic option transformed the Ayatollahs from a secondary power in 1979 to a leading regional and global power in 2024, and to extend a most critical support to Hezbollah, Houthi, Hamas and Latin American terrorists – a chief threat to global sanity and US national and homeland security. Contrary to the prevailing misperception, for the sake of global sanity, Iran’s Ayatollahs are not a partner for negotiations, but a target for regime-change.

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Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel Initiative”
July 2, 2024

The current pressure on Israel

*Since Israel’s establishment in 1948 – which was ferociously opposed by the State Department, and tenaciously realized by Israel’s defiant Founding Father, David Ben Gurion – The State Department has systematically pressured Israel to act against its own assessment of its own national security requirements.  In fact, in most cases, Israel’s compliance with State Department pressure undermined the US’ own interests, while a defiant Israel spared a major setback to the US’ own interests.

*Since the horrific Hamas terrorism of October 7, 2023, the State Department – which subscribes to a worldview, contending that terrorism is driven by despair, and therefore should be confronted diplomatically and financially, not militarily – has intensified the pressure on Israel to refrain from militarily preempting Hezbollah, the chief proxy of Iran’s Ayatollahs.

*In addition, the State Department has pressured Israel to switch from fighting – to negotiating with – Hamas, a proxy of Iran’s Ayatollahs and a branch of the Moslem Brotherhood, which is the largest Sunni terror organization in the world.  The pressure has been exerted, notwithstanding Hezbollah’s and Hamas’ commitment to fanatic, Islamic anti-US ideologies – which transcend financial and diplomatic benefits – mandating the toppling of all pro-US Arab regimes, bringing the “infidel” West, and especially “the great American Satan” to submission. Moreover, Hezbollah’s and Hamas’ ideologies are committed to the uprooting of the “infidel” Jewish state – which is deemed by them as the Middle East beachhead of the US – as evidenced in Hezbollah’s and Hamas’ school curriculum, mosque sermons and systematic regional and global terrorism, which extends to Latin America and the US homeland.

*The State Department pressures Israel into another round of negotiation with Iran-controlled Hezbollah and Hamas, despite the fact that all previous agreements were violated, intensifying terrorism, transforming these two terror entities into the most fortified above-ground and under-ground terror states in the world, and paving the road to the October 7 massacre and the current Iran-orchestrated Hamas and Hezbollah wars on Israel.

More examples of State Department ill-advised pressure on Israel:

*In 2006, Israel bowed to State Department pressure, allowing the participation of Hamas in the Palestinian Authority election, which catapulted Hamas to unprecedented political stature in Gaza, Judea and Samaria. 

*In 2006, Israel complied with State Department pressure (assisted by Israeli clones of Foggy Bottom), ending its war against Hezbollah through UN Security Council Resolution 1701, rather than through the obliteration of Hezbollah’s military infrastructure. It solidified Hezbollah’s dominance in Lebanon and bolstered its role as a regional and global epicenter of terrorism and drug trafficking in the service of Iran’s Ayatollahs, as demonstrated by Hezbollah’s expanded foothold on US soil, and growing terror collaboration with the drug cartels of Mexico, Columbia, Bolivia, Ecuador and Brazil.

*In 2000, the State Department offered an $800 MN inducement (which was never realized) for Israel’s intent to evacuate South Lebanon, which elevated Hezbollah into a dominant stature in Lebanon, and ushered in a 150,000 missile strong Hezbollah terror machine, fortified by a most advanced underground tunnel network, which may exceed Hamas’ tunnel complex.

*Since the 1993 establishment of the PLO-controlled Palestinian Authority, the State Department has promoted annual foreign aid to the Palestinian Authority, while pressuring Israel to facilitate the establishment of a Palestinian state. This policy has been pursued irrespective of the core Palestinian ideology and its rogue daily conduct – which mandate the annihilation of Israel – as evidenced by the 1964 PLO charter, Palestinian hate education, mosque sermons, monthly allowances to families of terrorists and the Palestinian intra-Arab terrorism. Foggy Bottom ignores the potential impact of a Palestinian state west of the Jordan river: toppling the pro-US Hashemite regime east of the river, transforming Jordan into an epicenter of anti-US Islamic terrorism and destabilizing the pro-US Arabian Peninsula regimes – a setback to Western economy and national and homeland security.

*In 1981, the State Department pressured (and punished) Israel against bombing Iraq’s nuclear reactor.  Israel defied the pressure, which spared the US a potential nuclear confrontation in 1991, and snatched the pro-US Arab oil-producing regimes from the jaws of the anti-US Saddam Hussein.

*In 1973, the State Department pressured Israel, successfully, against preempting Egypt and Syria. Israel’s defiance of this pressure would have spared the region the costly war of October 1973.

*In 1967, the State Department pressured Israel against preempting Egypt and Syria.  Israel defied the pressure, devastated Egypt’s military force, which was involved in an attempt to topple all pro-US Arab oil-producing regimes, at a time when the US was heavily dependent upon Persian Gulf oil. Israel’s defiance spared the US a dramatic national security and economic blow.

Israel’s survival requires defiance of State Department pressure   

*Israeli compliance with State Department pressure would snatch Hamas from the jaws of obliteration and would be perceived – in the Middle East – as a dramatic victory for Islamic terrorism. It would escalate the lethal threat (from the Moslem Brotherhood and Iran’s Ayatollahs) to every pro-US Arab regime, such as Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Egypt and Jordan, and to US homeland security (as recently stated by the FBI Director).

*Israeli capitulation to State Department pressure would devastate Israel’s posture of deterrence – in the volcanic Middle East, where one’s posture of deterrence is a prerequisite for one’s survival – which could induce an Iranian ballistic missile offensive against Israel and an Iran-supported terror offensive by Hamas, Hezbollah, the Palestinian Authority and radical Israeli Arabs. 

*Israel’s succumbing to State Department pressure would reduce/eliminate the inducement of moderate-Arab regimes to expand normalization/peace with Israel, which was initiated by their high respect for Israel’s posture of deterrence, in the face of the mutual threats by Iran’s Ayatollahs and the Moslem Brotherhood, and against the backdrop of the slackened US and Western posture of deterrence.  

*Refraining from the obliteration of Hamas’ military infrastructure and Hezbollah’s terrorist presence in South Lebanon would preclude the return of most Israeli evacuees (150,000 – equal to 5 million evacuees in the US) to their homes in the areas adjacent to Gaza and Lebanon.

*Both the US’ and Israel’s national security benefit from Israel’s defiance of State Department pressure, which highlights Israeli preference of long term national security over short term diplomatic convenience.

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Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel initiative”
June 6, 2024

*Western conventional wisdom (WCW) embraced Iran’s Ayatollahs in 1979 – while stabbing of the Shah of Iran, “America’s policeman in the Gulf,” in the back – and helping them catapult from a regional rogue regime to the most effective global epicenter of anti-Western terrorism, drug trafficking, money laundering and proliferation of military systems in 2024, constituting a clear and present threat to US homeland security.

*WCW has also afflicted Israel’s policy toward Palestinian terrorism, catapulting Hamas from a mini-terror organization in 2005 – upon Israel’s uprooting its civilian and military presence in Gaza – to the most fortified terror-state in 2024, which perpetrated the October 7, 2023 massacre. The Westernization of Israel’s national security policy was initially reflected by the 1993 Oslo Accord, which was negotiated with PLO terrorists – who have been dedicated since 1964 to the destruction of the “infidel” Jewish entity – and by the importation of 100,000 Palestinian terrorists from Tunisia, the Sudan, Yemen and Lebanon to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and Gaza.

*Middle East policy should be a derivative of the unpredictably violent and despotic Middle East reality – which has never experienced intra-Arab or intra-Moslem peaceful coexistence – and not a predictable and convenient alternate reality. Itshould avoid – not repeat – past critical mistakes.

*WCW has underestimated the centrality of fanatic and religious ideology in the forging of aspirations, strategies and policies of Iran’s Ayatollahs, the Moslem Brotherhood, Hamas, Hezbollah, Yemen’s Houthis and the Palestinian Authority.  While the West believes in separation of state and church, Islam believes in the dominance of religion in policy-making, particularly peace and war.  WCW assumes that “money talks,” ignoring the supremacy of Islamic ideologies over financial inducements, and takes lightly the 1,400-year-old conviction that Islam is the only divinely-ordained legitimate religion, bringing “apostates” and Western “infidels” – especially the US – to submission.   In fact, Islamic terrorism has haunted the US since the Barbary pirates in the early 19^th century, irrespective of US policy, and independent of the identity of the US President.

*WCW (and especially Secretary Blinken and National Security Advisor Sullivan) assumes that terrorists are driven by despair, and therefore should not be approached militarily, but by mega diplomatic and financial gestures.  WCW deludes itself that such gestures would induce the Ayatollahs to embrace peaceful coexistence with their Sunni neighbors, become good-faith negotiators and abandon their 1,400-year-old ideology.

However, Middle East reality considers gestures, concessions and retreats as weakness, which whets the appetite of rogue entities.

*WCW pressures Israel to adopt such a policy toward Palestinian terrorism, shifting from the military – to the diplomatic – option. It belittles the clout of the Islamic precept that ceasefire and peace negotiations (especially with “infidels”) are temporary, until an opportunity arises to overcome the enemy.

*WCW maintains that Israel must negotiate with – not obliterate – Hamas, irrespective of Hamas’ anti-Western ideology/charter, school curriculum, mosque sermons, idolization of terrorists and systematic terrorism – which mandate the elimination of Israel and the submission of the Western “infidel.”  WCW dismisses the lessons of Israel’s 17-year-systematic negotiation with Hamas, which has dramatically bolstered Hamas’ terroristic capabilities, yielding the October 7, 2023 massacre. WCW ignores the fact that constructive negotiation may take place only between entities, whose visions do not require the elimination of one another. Thus, peace accords were successfully negotiated between Israel and Egypt, Jordan, the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and South Sudan, and Israel-Saudi cooperation has been exceptionally productive.

*WCW is enthralled with the Palestinian Authority moderate talk, concluding that a Palestinian state would be reformed, adhering to peaceful coexistence. However, all pro-Western Arab leaders are preoccupied with the Palestinian walk, which has transformed the Palestinians into a role model of intra-Arab subversion, terrorism and treachery: terrorizing Egypt in the 1950s, Syria in the 1960s, Jordan in 1970, Lebanon from 1970-1982 and Kuwait in 1990, while always siding with enemies and rivals of the West, such as Nazi German, the Soviet Bloc, Iran’s Ayatollahs, the Moslem Brotherhood, international terrorist organizations, Venezuela, Cuba, North Korea, China and Russia. They have concluded that a Palestinian state would doom the pro-Western Hashemite regime, transforming Jordan into another epicenter of global, anti-Western Islamic terrorism. This would threaten all pro-Western Arab oil-producing regimes, thus rewarding the Ayatollahs, the Moslem Brotherhood, China and Russia, and deal a dramatic blow to Western economies, homeland and national security. Therefore, Arabs have refrained from an effective walk on behalf of a Palestinian state.

*WCW has attempted to hoodwink Israel into retreat from the strategically over-towering mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria – in the tectonic, intolerant and violent Middle East – to the pre-1967 9 to 15-mile-wide-sliver along the Mediterranean, in return for a peace accord, in the Middle East which features no intra-Moslem peaceful-coexistence, as well as tenuous non-democratic regimes, and therefore tenuous policies and accords. In this region, posture of deterrence (e.g., controlling the mountain ridges of Judea and Judea) – not the highly regarded peace accords – is the most crucial component of national security.  While mountain ridges are fixed components, Middle East peace accords are variables.

*WCW insistence to subordinate Middle East reality to its own alternate reality has been highlighted by the failure of all Western peace initiatives, which centered on the Palestinian issue, while the six successful Israel-Arab peace treaties centered on Arab – not Palestinian – interests.

*Additional highlights of the self-destructive nature of WCW are the critical tailwind it accorded the Ayatollahs’ 1979 toppling of the Shah of Iran; the embrace of Saddam Hussein as an ally until his 1990 invasion of Kuwait, and punishing Israel for destroying Iraq’s nuclear reactor in 1981; the 1994 awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to the chief Palestinian terrorist, Arafat, and defining Mahmoud Abbas – the founder of Palestinian hate education, incitement and monthly allowances to families of terrorists – as a moderate.  In addition, the 2000 welcoming of Bashar Assad as a potentially moderate leader; the welcoming of the 2011 Arab Tsunami (which still haunts the Arab Street) as if it were the Arab Spring, Facebook and Youth Revolution; the 2011 toppling of Gaddafi, which transformed Libya into a major platform of anti-Western Islamic terrorism and an arena of perpetual civil war; etc.    

 *Western conventional wisdom has persisted in the attempt to subordinate Middle East reality to its own alternate reality, thus, learning from history by repeating – not avoiding – past critical mistakes, severely undermining Western national and homeland security.

*Israel should be aware of the failed Western track record in the Middle East, when assessing – skeptically – Western policy recommendations, such as the establishment of a Palestinian state, and negotiation with – rather than obliteration of – Hamas.

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Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel Initiative”
May 22, 2024

*Secretary of State Antony Blinken is a true believer in the diplomatic option toward Iran’s Ayatollahs. He rules out regime-change and military options, irrespective of the Ayatollahs’ 45-year-old track record of anti-US terrorism, drug trafficking, money laundering and proliferation of advanced military systems.  

*Currently, Blinken is pressuring Israel to negotiate another ceasefire with Hamas, disregarding the litany of previous ceasefires, which bolstered Hamas’ terror capabilities. He leans on Israel to shift from the military option to the diplomatic option, snatching Hamas from the jaws of obliteration. Such a shift would be perceived by all Middle East entities as a dramatic victory for Hamas and a major defeat for Israel, fueling more terrorism and war against Israel and all pro-US Arab countries, which already have the machetes of Islamic terrorism at their throats. It will also reduce the Arab/Moslem interest to conclude additional peace treaties with Israel, and inspire Islamic terrorism on US soil, as stated by FBI Director, Chris Wray.

According to AP: “In a pair of TV interviews, Secretary Blinken underscored that the United States believes Israeli forces should ‘get out of Gaza…,’ reiterating the longstanding U.S. opposition to the growing Israeli offensive in Rafah.…”  According to PBS: “US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Israeli leaders in his push for a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas…. ‘We are determined to get a ceasefire…. There is a proposal on the table, and as we have said: no delays, no excuses, the time is now….’ The proposal would put a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza up for discussion….”

*Secretary of State, Antony Blinken is genuinely determined to advance the cause of peace and stability in the Middle East, but he is driven by a speculative future scenario, which is a derivative of an alternate reality, detached from Middle East reality.

*Blinken underestimates the role of the larger context of Hamas’ and Hezbollah’s terrorism, which is critically financed, supplied and trained by Iran’s Ayatollahs, who support and collaborate with anti-US regimes in the Middle East, Africa and Latin America, including Latin American drug cartels in Mexico, Columbia, Bolivia, Ecuador and Brazil.

*Irrespective of the systematically rogue anti-US track record of the Ayatollahs – since toppling the Shah of Iran in February 1979 – Blinken sticks to the diplomatic/negotiation option, which has been a bonanza for Iran’s anti-US strategy.  He refuses to recognize that the Ayatollahs are not partners for peaceful coexistence and good-faith negotiation, but a target for regime-change, which would liberate the oppressed majority of Iran, eliminate the chief threat to the survival of every pro-US Arab regime, eradicate a major hurdle on the way of more Israel-Arab peace accords, and would deprive anti-US global Islamic terrorism of its leading epicenter. A regime change would generate a robust tailwind to regional and global stability and peaceful coexistence.

*Blinken takes lightly the 17-year-long track record of Israel-Hamas confrontations, which documents that ceasefire agreements are leveraged by Hamas to bolster its Moslem Brotherhood directed terror machine.

*Blinken underrates the fact that any policy toward the Israel-Hamas war should be a derivative of the 1,400-year-old intrinsic features of Middle East reality. For instance, the absence of intra-Moslem and intra-Arab peaceful coexistence; the violent intolerance towards “infidels,” “apostates” as well as “believers”; the absence of democracy, human rights and long term compliance with agreements; shifty and unpredictable policies and violence; the tenuous nature of all Arab regimes, which ascend to – and lose – power via the “bullet” (violence), and not via the ballot; the tenuous nature of  these regimes’ policies and accords; the centrality of fanatic ideology, which transcends the Western notion of “money talks;” etc.

*In this frustrating volcanic reality of the Middle East – unlike the much more convenient and predictable State Department’s alternate reality – the most critical component of national security is posture of deterrence, rather than negotiation and peace accords, which are as tenuous as the regimes that conduct them. 

*While a bolstered posture of deterrence minimizes war and terrorism, an eroded posture of deterrence whets the appetite of rogue entities; thus, intensifying war and terrorism, regionally and globally.

*Israel’s posture of deterrence was demolished by its own October 7 debacle(!), and its military strategy since then has aimed to restore it, in order to rebound and avoid eventual destruction.

*Secretary Blinken underrates the centrality of fanatical visions and ideologies in the Middle East, and therefore assumes that constructive negotiation may take place among all parties. He ignores the fact that constructive negotiation may take place between entities, whose vision does not require the elimination of one another. Thus, peace accords were successfully negotiated between Israel and Egypt, Jordan, the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and South Sudan, and Israel-Saudi cooperation has been exceptionally productive.

*None of these agreements were preconditioned upon the establishment of a Palestinian state! Arabs consider the Palestinians as a role model of intra-Arab subversion, terrorism and treachery, and therefore shower the Palestinian with embracing talk, while the actual walk ranges from indifferent-to-negative.

*These Arab countries would prefer a Middle East devoid of “an infidel” Jewish sovereignty, but the fulfillment of their national visions is not predicated upon the elimination of Israel. In fact, they consider Israel as an effective national security ally in the face of Iran’s Ayatollahs and the Moslem Brotherhood.  

*On the other hand, constructive negotiation cannot take place between Israel and Hamas, since the fulfillment of Hamas’ fanatical vision – as stipulated in the 1988 Hamas charter, its hate-education and mosque-incitement and Hamas’ terrorism – is preconditioned upon the elimination of the “infidel” Jewish State. The same applies to the Palestinian Authority, whose annihilationist vision is stated by the 1964 and 1959 charters of the PLO and Fatah terror organizations – 3 and 8 years before the 1967 War – which are embedded in the PA’s hate education, mosque incitement, the idolization of terrorists and systematic terrorism – calling for the elimination of Israel.

*The US State Department is advised to pay more attention to the reality of the Middle East, and abandon its systematically failing alternate reality.

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Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel Initiative”
May 7, 2024

On April 29, 2024, Secretary of State, Blinken, expressed his hopeful vision: “We continue to work… on a plan to build a just and lasting peace, a pathway to a state of the Palestinians with guarantees for Israel’s security as part of a more integrated and a more secure region… greater stability in this region and to prevent conflict from spreading….”

*However, policy-making should not be based on hope, but on reality. It should be a derivative of Middle East reality, where Iranian, Hezbollah and Palestinian (PLO and Hamas) terrorists are driven by fanatic visions and by an unwavering commitment to bring their enemies to submission. They are not driven by despair, neither by peaceful coexistence with their enemies, nor by life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. In the Middle East, deeply-rooted zealot ideologies transcend “money talks.”

*Moreover, reality has documented that terrorists bite the hands that feed them, as demonstrated by Iran’s Ayatollahs (whose rise to power was critically assisted by the US), Afghanistan’s Mujahideen (whose victory over the USSR was enabled by the US), Libya’s Islamic terrorists (who gained power due to a US-led NATO military offensive against Qadhafi), the Palestinian Authority (which was imported by Israel into Judea and Samaria), Hamas (which owes much of its terrorist maneuverability to Israel’s disengagement from Gaza), etc.

*Hence, the failure of all State Department’s Israel-Arab peace proposals, which centered on Palestinian interests, contrary to the successful conclusion of six Israel-Arab peace accords, which centered on Arab national interests, denying Palestinians a veto power over the peace process.

*Secretary Blinken’s hope-based vision of a Palestinian state, which would peacefully-coexist with Israel and Jordan and contribute to regional stability, is detached from the 70-year-old Palestinian intra-Arab track record, the 85-year-old interaction with enemies and rivals of the US (Nazi Germany, the Soviet Bloc, Ayatollah Khomeini, Latin American and global terrorism, North Korea, Venezuela, Cuba, Russia, China, the Moslem Brotherhood, etc.), and the 100-year-old anti-Jewish Palestinian terrorism.

*Contrary to Secretary Blinken, who is preoccupied with positive, convenient and speculative future scenarios and with Palestinian talk (with Western movers and shakers), all pro-US Arab leaders are preoccupied with the well-documented Palestinian intra-Arab rogue track record, which has transformed Palestinians into the role model of intra-Arab subversion, terrorism, ingratitude and treachery.

*Arab leaders are aware that the Palestinian track record means that the proposed Palestinian state would add fuel – not water – to the Middle East fire. In fact, Egypt does not welcome Palestinian migration from Gaza to Sinai, due to many years of Palestinian collaboration with Islamic and global terrorism, as well as the precedent of the 1950s, when Egypt-hosted-Palestinians collaborated with the Moslem Brotherhood, terrorizing their host government.

*Arab leaders are aware that the combination of the Palestinian track record, Jordan’s domestic predicament, and the intensifying Iranian subversion in Jordan, would transform a Palestinian state west of the Jordan River into the terminator of the pro-US Hashemite regime east of the River.  This would mutate Jordan into a major platform of anti-US Islamic terrorism, yielding ripple effects into the Arabian Peninsula and the Sinai Desert, threatening the survival of every pro-US Arab oil producing regime, as well as Egypt. This would yield a strategic bonanza to Iran’s Ayatollahs, Moslem Brotherhood terrorists, Russia and China, while causing a critical setback to all pro-US Arab regimes, and the US’ economy, national and homeland security.  

*Contrary to Secretary Blinken, Arab policy-makers are driven by Palestinian walk, not talk. They know that, in the Middle East, on words one does not pay custom. Furthermore, Arab policy toward the proposed Palestinian state is not reflected by the Arab talk – which has warmly embraced the Palestinians since 1948 – but by the Arab walk, which has refrained – since 1948 – from any tangible initiative to advance the cause of a Palestinian state. For example, all six Israel-Arab peace accords (Egypt, Jordan, the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and South Sudan), and Israel’s ground-breaking cooperation with Saudi Arabia, were not preconditioned upon the establishment of a Palestinian state. In addition, the November 2024 joint summit of the Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation rejected a proposed resolution – by Iran, Algeria and the Palestinian Authority – to suspend all diplomatic, economic, touristic and defense cooperation with Israel. Arabs do not subordinate their own national interests on the Palestinian altar.

*US national and homeland security require a US policy in the Middle East, which is a derivative of the frustrating, violent, intolerant and unpredictable Middle East reality, not a convenient, optimistic alternate reality; a policy which seeks long term security, not short term convenience; avoiding and not repeating past critical mistakes.

Support Appreciated

Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel Initiative”
April 24, 2024

*Israel is grateful to the US and its Arab allies for their support in the face of Iran’s ballistic offensive against Israel.

*At the same time, Israel’s war against the Ayatollahs – who constitute a clear and present lethal threat to the pro-US Arab regimes, as well as a potent threat to the US’ homeland security – enhances the national security and homeland security of the US and its Arab allies.

*In fact, FBI Director, Chris Wray, highlighted the Iranian threat during his hearings at the House and Senate Committees on Homeland Security. Wray stated that the October 7, 2023 horrific Hamas terrorism is inspiring Iran-supported anti-US Islamic terrorists to attack US targets throughout the globe, including on the US homeland.

*The Middle East considers Israel as the US’ main beachhead and force-multiplier, and as a role-model of countering-terrorism in a region, which is critical to global trade and to the supply of oil and natural gas, as well as a global epicenter of anti-US terrorism and drug trafficking. Anti-US rogue entities assume that hitting Israel injures the US strategic posture in the Middle East and beyond.

*Since the early 1980s, Iran and Hezbollah have operated in Latin America – which they view as the soft underbelly of the US – along with the drug cartels of Mexico, Colombia, Bolivia, Ecuador and Brazil, Latin American terror organizations and all anti-US Latin American governments. Moreover, they’ve intensified their presence along the US-Mexico border and on US soil, in order to advance the vision of Iran’s Ayatollahs: bringing “The Great American Satan” to submission.

*The Ayatollahs are also determined to topple the pro-US Sunni Arab regimes in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Jordan, Egypt and Morocco. 

*Recently, the Ayatollahs have intensified their attempts to topple Jordan’s pro-US Hashemite regime, which would complete the encircling of Saudi Arabia by Iran and its proxies (in Yemen, Iraq and Syria), and radically aggravate lethal threats to Israel. The Ayatollahs activate their terror-proxies in Jordan-bordering Iraq and Syria, as well as the terror potential among the 2 million Syrian refugees in northern Jordan.  In addition, the Ayatollahs have forged ties with the subversive infrastructure of the Jordan-based Moslem Brotherhood, and leverage the fragmentation among Jordan’s Bedouin tribes, and the history of confrontations between the Hashemite regime and its Palestinian majority. 

*The dramatic catapulting of Iran’s Ayatollahs to a dramatic regional and global prominence – since their February ascension to power – has been largely a derivative of the US State Department’s policy.  This policy has adhered to the diplomatic option, opposing the regime-change option, irrespective of the Ayatollahs’ systematic anti-US track record of regional and global terrorism, drug trafficking, money laundering and proliferation of advanced military technologies. It is based on an alternate reality, whereby a financial and diplomatic bonanza could induce the Ayatollahs to accept peaceful coexistence, become good faith negotiators and abandon their 1,400-year-old vision.

*While the US attempts to deter Iran’s Ayatollahs (“Don’t”), the State Department has waived and softened economic sanctions on Iran, which has rewarded Tehran with well over $100bn, which have been mostly channelled to the Ayatollahs’ anti-US policy.

*Simultaneously, the State Department is pressuring Israel to limit its independent military actions against Iran, to replace the military option toward Hamas with the diplomatic option, and to facilitate the establishment of a Palestinian state. The State Department aims to impose on Israel its own alternate reality, ignoring the volcanic, violently unpredictable Middle East reality; thus, eroding Israel’s posture of deterrence, which would yield a robust tailwind to terrorism and wars, posing a Iranian-Palestinian death sentence to the pro-US Hashemite regime in Jordan, transforming Jordan into a platform of Islamic terrorism, which would constitute a lethal threat to Saudi Arabia and all other pro-US Arab regimes.

*In the face of pressure Israel should prefer long-term national security over short-term convenience.

*For instance, during the several Israel-Hamas wars of the last 17 years, effective US pressure snatched Hamas from the jaws of defeat. It dramatically bolstered Hamas capabilities, facilitating the October 7, 2024 massacre of 1,200 Israeli civilians (equal to 40,000 American civilians). On the other hand, Israel’s repelling of the 1981 US brutal pressure, and bombing Iraq’s nuclear reactor, in defiance of US (realized) threats to withhold the supply of combat aircraft and suspend defense cooperation agreements, freed pro-US Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Oman from a lethal Iraqi nuclear threat, and spared the US in 1991 a potential nuclear confrontation with Iraq.

*Since 1948, Israel fended off a series of US pressures, which would have corroded Israel’s posture of deterrence, denying the US the largest American aircraft carrier, which does not require a single American on board.

For example:

*Spurning US pressure to refrain from the 1967 preemptive war, which decimated the Egyptian military, when the pro-Soviet Egypt was about to topple the pro-US, oil-producing Arab regimes of the Arabian Peninsula (at a time when the US was heavily dependent on Gulf oil).

*Fending off US pressure to rescind the 1981 application of the Israeli law to – and retreat from – the Golan Heights, which has bolstered Israel’s capabilities to constrain the military maneuverability of Iran and Syria and emerge as an effective line of defense of Jordan’s pro-US Hashemite regime and the Arab Gulf States.

*Rebuffing US pressure to end the 1949 ”occupation” of West Jerusalem, the Western Galilee and major parts of the coastal plain and the Negev, which would have transformed Israel into a strategic burden, fully dependent upon active US military personnel for protection.

*The track record of US pressure demonstrates that succumbing to pressure injures Israel’s national security, while defying pressure safeguards Israel’s national security and advances vital US interests.

*During the 1991 First Gulf War, the US pressured Israel to avoid reacting to Iraq’s Scud missiles. Prime Minister Shamir acceded, because it was, primarily, a US war against Saddam Hussein and for the liberation of Kuwait. In 2024, the US pressures Israel to avoid a significant military preemption against Iran’s Ayatollahs, despite the fact that – unlike 1991 – this is, primarily, Israel’s war against Iran’s Ayatollahs.

The bottom line

*Middle East reality, in particular, and military precedents, in general, behoove Israel to shun military reaction, containment and surgical offensive, and preempt enemies (irrespective of US pressure), which are driven by deeply-rooted fanatic ideologies, that focus on the existence – not the size – of the Jewish State.

*Moreover, the cost of today’s preemption would be dwarfed by the cost of reacting to a significantly-upgraded, and possibly nuclear, Iran.

*A precondition for cooling off the regional and global impact of the volcanic Middle East reality, and for reducing the threat of Islamic terrorism on the US soil, and for ending oppression of women and ethnic and religious minorities in Iran is changing – not negotiating with – the regime in Iran.

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Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel Initiative”
April 3, 2024

State Department confronts Middle East reality

*Since 1978/79, notwithstanding Iran’s anti-US terrorism, drug trafficking and proliferation of advanced military systems, the State Department has persisted in its suspension of disbelief, as reflected by the diplomatic option, which has bolstered Iran’s anti-US rogue operations, increasingly in Latin America. The diplomatic option assumes that the Ayatollahs are amenable to good faith negotiation and peaceful coexistence. It dismisses the regime-change option, and resists the option of a viable military option hovering above the head of Iran’s rogue Ayatollahs. The State Department’s detachment from Middle East reality has been underscored by the suspension of economic (and especially oil export) sanctions, which has yielded to the Ayatollahs’ anti-US rogue machine more than $100BN since February 2021.

*In 2024, the State Department pressures Israel brutally to adopts its own self-destructive policy, aborting the military option – hence the opposition to Israel’s military offensive in Rafah – and replacing it with a diplomatic option toward Hamas, which is a branch of the Moslem Brotherhood (the largest Sunni terror organization, whose vision is to bring the “infidel” West to submission) and a proxy of Iran’s Ayatollahs (whose vision is to bring “The Great American Satan” to submission).

*Since 2010, the State Department has referred to the turbulence on the Arab Street – which is still raging – as “The Arab Spring” and “March of democracy,” failing to grasp the fanatic ideologies feeding the turbulence, which has been an “Arab Tsunami,” that has been a fixture in the volcanic, intolerant, despotic, shifty, tenuous and violently unpredictable Middle East since the 7^th century.

*In 2024, the State Department ignores the centrality of the 1,400-year-old fanatical, religious ideologies which are the core of the state of mind, vision, education, policy-making and terrorism of Hamas, the PLO (the Palestinian Authority) and Hezbollah, deluding itself that terrorists are driven by despair, and seek freedom and enhanced standard of living, and therefore should be dealt with by dramatic financial gestures and negotiation, and rewarded by a Palestinian state.

*Thus, the State Department ignores the 1,400-year-old Middle East reality, where terrorists bite the hand that feeds them (e.g., Iran’s Ayatollahs, the Mujahideen, Saddam Hussein, the PLO, Hamas). 

*Moreover, Middle East reality – contrary to “Middle East alternate reality” – has demonstrated that gestures, concessions and appeasement are perceived as weakness, whetting terrorists’ appetites and intensify terrorism.

*The State Department has ignored the fact that the PLO (the Palestinian Authority) and Hamas share a fanatic vision (as reflected in their charters, school curriculum, mosque sermons, official media, idolization of terrorists, monthly allowances to families of terrorists and actual terrorism), which stipulates the uprooting of the “infidel” Jewish sovereignty from the “abode of Islam,” irrespective of its size, precluding a genuine peace accord with Israel.  On the other hand, Israel has been able to expand commercial and defense ties with Saudi Arabia, and conclude peace accords with Egypt, Jordan, the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and the Southern Sudan, since these countries are driven by non-fanatic visions, that do not require the destruction of the Jewish State.

*The State Department’s two-state-solution has played down the PLO’s and Hamas’ annihilationist vision, as well as the rogue intra-Arab track record of the Palestinian leadership. It dwells upon a speculative scenario of peaceful-coexistence – which contradicts the Palestinian track record – whereas in reality no intra-Arab and intra-Moslem peaceful-coexistence has been achieved since the 7^th century.

The October 7 debacle and awakening

*The pre-October 7, 2023 Israeli policy embraced the State Department’s diplomatic option and “money talks” policy, offering Hamas generous financial and political gestures. It was seasoned by a series of ceasefires with – rather than the obliteration of – Hamas, as well as defense and retaliation, rather than offense and preemption. Just like the State Department, Israel ignored the dominance of Hamas’ deeply-entrenched ideology over financial and diplomatic benefits.

*Israel’s pre-October 7, 2023 State Department-like detachment from Middle East reality dramatically bolstered Hamas capabilities, which (on October 7) demolished Israel’s posture of deterrence, in a region where posture of deterrence is the most critical component of national security and survival.

*Since October 7, 2023, Israel has attempted – so far successfully – to restore much of its posture of deterrence.  A restoration of Israel’s posture of deterrence – in the volcanic Middle East – mandates the obliteration of Hamas, militarily and politically. Hence, the military operation in Rafah.

*Reality determines that – just like a forest fire – Hamas must be fully obliterated, lest it re-bursts in a most lethal wave of terrorism.  Middle East reality is aware that enabling Hamas to escape obliteration – as aspired by the State Department – would inspire more terrorism on the part of Hamas, Hezbollah, the PLO (the Palestinian Authority) and radical Israeli Arabs. In addition, Hamas’ survival would generate a tailwind to Islamic terrorism against every pro-US Arab regime, as well as against US installations throughout the globe and (as stated by FBI Director, Chris Wray, in the US homeland by “home grown American terrorists.”

*Also, Saudi Arabia and the six countries, which concluded peace accords with Israel, have been induced into defense and commercial ties with Israel, mostly, by Israel’s posture of deterrence in the face of Iran’s Ayatollahs and the Moslem Brotherhood whose machetes are at their throats. Therefore, the full restoration of Israel’s posture of deterrence is a prerequisite for the maintenance and expansion of the Israel-Arab peace process.

*Furthermore, the restoration of Israel’s posture of deterrence, which hinges on Israel’s qualitative military edge (QME), has advanced US interests by allowing the US to minimize its military presence in the region, constraining wars and terrorism, deterring anti-US regional and global entities, minimizing regional instability, and serving as a unique force-multiplier and a battle-tested laboratory for the US armed forces and defense and aerospace industries.

The bottom line

*US and Israeli national security interests behoove both countries to avoid – rather than repeat – past critical mistakes. This would be best-served by a credible military option and adherence to Middle East reality, not to alternate reality, irrespective of how convenient, peaceful and tempting alternate reality may be.

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Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel Initiative”
March 27, 2024

*The March 25, 2024 UN Security Council resolution 2728 came in the aftermath of the murder – by Hamas – of 1,300 Israelis on October 7, which is equal to 40,000 Americans murdered on a single day!

*A US abstention facilitated the passage of resolution 2728, which aims to snatch Hamas Palestinian terrorists from the jaws of obliteration, while establishing a Palestinian state. Therefore, it was enthusiastically welcome by Iran’s Ayatollahs, Hamas and the Palestinian Authority.

*The US abstention reflects the dominance of the cosmopolitan worldview of the State Department in the shaping of US foreign policy and national security policy, subordinating unilateral US national security action to multilateral cooperation with the inherently anti-US UN and the vacillating and terrorist-appeasing Europe.

*The State Department worldview ignores Hamas’ role as the core cause of the current war, an inspiration for Iran, al-Qaeda and ISIS-supported Islamic terrorists, who are planning Hamas-like terror assaults against all Arab regimes, the West, and especially the US, increasingly from Central America.

*The military and political survival of Hamas – compliment of resolution 2728 – would be, rightly, interpreted in the Middle East as a major victory for Islamic terrorism,  and a severe blow to Israel’s posture of deterrence, which would yield an Iran-led terrorist tsunami against Israel and all pro-US Arab countries (e.g., a repeaet of the October 7 horrific terrorism, Hezbollah, Intifada’ # 3 in Judea and Samaria which could reach Tel Aviv, radical Israeli Arabs, and a domestic upheaval in Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Morocco). Moreover, an erosion of Israel’s posture of deterrence would injure the peace process with Saudi Arabia, which has been induced by Israel’s viable posture of deterrence in the face of the mutual threats of Iran and the Moslem Brotherhood.  

*According to Blinken, a key component of Security Council resolution 2728 – in addition to “a ceasefire, hostage release and increased humanitarian aid” –  is the establishment of “a clear pathway toward a Palestinian state with security guarantees for Israel… long-term peace and security….”

*However, Blinken’s scenario of a peacefully-coexisting Palestinian state is based on moderate Palestinian diplomatic and media talk and speculative futurePalestinian behavior. But, Middle East reality documents a rogue Palestinian walk (especially vs. Arab countries), which stipulates that the proposed Palestinian state would add fuel, not water, to the Middle East fire. It would undermine the interests of the US and all its Arab allies, while advancing the interests of all US’ rivals and enemies.

*Contrary to Blinken’s eagerness to establish a Palestinian state, all pro-US Arab countries’ walk reflects their view of the Palestinians as a role model of intra-Arab subversion, terrorism and treachery.

*Blinken’s addiction to the proposed Palestinian state as a venue to peaceful coexistence overlooks the volcanic ramifications of a Palestinian state contiguous to Jordan’s explosive domestic scene: a stormy relations – including a civil war – between the pro-US Hashemite regime and the Palestinian majority; a deeply entrenched Moslem Brotherhood; 2 million Syrian refugees in northern Jordan; intensified Iranian subversion through Iraq and Syria; and deeply fragmented Bedouin community. Thus, a Palestinian state west of the Jordan River would doom the pro-US Hashemite regime east of the River, transforming Jordan into an arena of rival terrorist organizations, posing a lethal threat to all pro-US oil-producing Arab regimes in the Arabian Peninsula, jeopardizing the exportation of Persian Gulf oil and global trade, rendering a bonanza to Iran’s Ayatollahs, the Moslem Brotherhood, Russia, China and North Korea, and dealing a blow to the US economy, national and homeland security.

*Secretary Blinken, who is a role model of the State Department worldview, assumes that terrorism should be confronted diplomatically, not militarily, since it is supposedly driven by despair and not by a fanatic ideology. Notwithstanding the 1,400-year-old violently unpredictable, shifty and anti “infidel” Middle East reality (which has yet to experience intra-Moslem peaceful coexistence, and irrespective of the rogue, anti-US track record of the Ayatollahs’ and Palestinian terrorism, Blinken is convinced that dramatic diplomatic and financial gestures (“money talks”) could induce terror regimes to abandon their ideology, accept peaceful-coexistence and good-faith negotiation.

*Secretary Blinken attempts – once again – to appease rogue Middle Eastern entities, by ignoring Middle East precedents, which have documented that terrorists bite the hand that feeds them, as demonstrated by Iran’s Ayatollahs, Afghanistan’s Mujahideen, Iraq’s Saddam Hussein, Libya’s Islamic terrorists, Palestinian terrorism, etc.

*In defiance of Middle East reality and the Moslem Brotherhood charter and track record since 1928, the State Department refuses to recognize its terroristic nature. Thus, Hamas is a branch of the Moslem Brotherhood, whose vision is to topple all national Moslem regimes, establish a universal Islamic society, with Islam as the only divinely-ordained legitimate religion, and to bring the “infidel” West to submission. Hamas is also a proxy of Iran’s Ayatollahs, whose 1,400-year-old vision mandates the destruction of “the Great American Satan.” Also, the Moslem Brotherhood and Iran’s Ayatollahs have their machetes at the throat of every pro-US Arab regime.

The bottom line

*Will the State Department’s conventional wisdom keep ignoring – or recognize – the march of facts, which has exposed the costly detachment of Foggy Bottom from Middle East reality?

*Will the State Department persists in preferring the multilateral cooperation with the UN and Europe over an independent, unilateral US national security action?

*“Those who experience wake up calls usually discover, in hindsight, that they had received plenty of warning before the poop hit the propeller, but they chose to disregard it…. Whether a wake-up call becomes a boon, or a bane, depends on what you’re willing to learn from it, and whether you’re willing to be moved by experience.” (Greg Levoy, a psychologist and an author).

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Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel Initiative”
February 8, 2024

Prof. Bernard Lewis, who was a leading authority on Islam and the Middle East, shed light on a cardinal aspect of the frustrating, complicated and inconvenient reality of the Middle East: “If the fighters in the war for Islam are fighting for God, it follows that their opponents are fighting against God…. In the classical Islamic view, the world is divided into two: the House of Islam… and the House of Unbelief, which it is the duty of Muslims ultimately to bring to Islam…. The struggle between these rival systems has now lasted for some 14 centuries…. America has become the archenemy, the incarnation of evil, the diabolic opponent of all that is good… of Islam….”

*Western conventional wisdom has been based on the assumptions that Middle East violence is despair-driven; that radical Middle East dictators can be induced to subordinate their radical ideologies to dramatic financial benefits (“money talks”); and that significant gestures and concessions could motivate rogue Middle East leaders to embrace peaceful coexistence, compliance with agreements, adoption of human rights and democracy, to depart from fanatic ideologies, and to join the “multilateral/cosmopolitan club.”

*In order to advance its well-intentioned assumptions, Western conventional wisdom has consistently overlooked the 1,400-year-old shifty, unpredictable, violent, totalitarian, intolerant, anti-“infidel” (Islam vs. the West), anti-“apostate” (Shiite vs. Sunni), fragmented, volcanic and frustrating nature of Middle East (intra-Arab and intra-Moslem) reality. It has also overlooked the supremacy of fanatical ideologies over financial benefits in shaping the policy of Iran’s Ayatollahs, the Moslem Brotherhood, Hezbollah, Hamas and the Palestinian Authority, as reflected in their (K-12) school curriculum, mosque sermons and constitutions/charters.

*Western appeasement of Shiite, Sunni and Palestinian terrorism has ignored the well-documented fact, that terrorists bite the hands that feed them, as demonstrated by the Mujahideen (who were assisted by the US to drive the USSR out of Afghanistan and proceeded to carry out 9/11), Iran’s Ayatollahs (who were critically assisted by the US to topple the Shah of Iran and proceeded to become the lead  anti-US terrorist and drug trafficker) and the Palestinian leadership (which was hosted by Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Kuwait and proceeded to subvert and terrorize them).

*In defiance of Western conventional wisdom, the inherent hostility toward the “infidel” West, and especially “the Great American Satan,” has been a dominant feature of fundamental Arab and Islamic education, culture and politics, fomenting epicenters of global anti-US terrorism.

*Notwithstanding Western conventional wisdom-driven gestures, Islamic terrorism has haunted the US since the Barbary pirates in the beginning of the 19^th century, irrespective of US policy, and independent of the identity of the US President. Thus, it afflicted the US during Presidents Trump (e.g., the Hudson River Park terrorism murdering 8), Obama (e.g., the Orlando terrorism murdering 49), G.W. Bush (9/11 murdering 2,977), Clinton (e.g., the car-bombing of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania murdering 300), Reagan (e.g., the blowing-up of PanAm-103 murdering 257), etc.

*9/11 underscored the determination of Islamic terror regimes to engage the US in their battle to bring the “infidel” West to submission, irrespective of the US’ intent to disengage from Afghanistan, Iraq and the Middle East at-large. These rogue regimes view the US’ disengagement, isolationism and gestures as symptoms of Western battle-fatigue and the erosion of a posture of deterrence, which intensifies terrorism and shifts the battle gradually to the US mainland (e.g., Iran’s and Hezbollah’s sleeper cells in the US and collaboration with Latin American terror organizations and drug cartels).

*Islamic terrorism is not driven by despair, but rather by the imperialistic vision of Islam as the only legitimate religion, divinely-ordained to bring “apostates” and “infidels” – especially the US – to submission, peacefully or militarily.

*The following examples demonstrate the unbridgeable gap between Western conventional wisdom (WCW) and Middle East reality:

<While WCW believes in the separation of state and church and secular policy making, Islam believes in the dominance of religion in domestic and foreign policy-making, civic life, justice, law and order, education, culture, peace, war and geo-strategy.

<While WCW is preoccupied with the present and the future, the Middle East is preoccupied with the past 1,400 years as a base for future undertaking. For instance, WCW shapes its positive attitude toward the proposed Palestinian state according to future, speculative scenarios (e.g., peaceful coexistence), but the Arabs shape their indifferent-to-negative attitude toward the proposed Palestinian state according to the subversive and terroristic Palestinian track record in the intra-Arab sphere.

<While WCW underscores give-and-take, Islam is determined to bring the adversary/enemy (especially the “apostate” and “infidel”) to submission, peacefully or militarily, employing dissimulation, in order to mislead naïve opponents.

<While WCW refers to the Arab-Israeli conflict as “the Middle East conflict,” 11 million Muslims have been killed since 1948, of which 35,000 – 0.3% – were related to Arab-Israel wars.

<While WCW assumes that the Palestinian issue is the crux of the Arab-Israeli conflict, a crown-jewel of Arab policy makers and a core cause of Middle East turbulence, no Arab-Israeli war was every triggered by the Palestinian issue.  No Arab country has ever flexed a military muscle, or a substantial financial muscle on behalf of the Palestinians.  No Israel-Palestinian war has ever expanded into a regional war, and no major Middle East turbulence has ever erupted due to the Palestinian issue.

<While WCW has focused on the Arab talk, which embraces the proposed Palestinian state, the Arab walk refrains from advancing the cause of a Palestinian state. It is consistent with Aa dominant Middle East motto: on words one does not pay custom.

<While WCW assumes that ceasefire agreements advance the cause of peace, and peace accords end hostilities and the state of war, Islam considers ceasefires (especially with “infidels”) as an opportunity to regroup for the next phase of a perpetual war until submission of the enemy.  Peace accords are viewed (especially with “infidels”) as temporary ceasefires, serving the cause of the Moslem party, to be abrogated upon amassing sufficient power to bring adversaries to submission.

*The self-destructive nature of WCW (e.g., the 45-year-old diplomatic option toward Iran in defiance of Iran’s rogue track record) is exposed by the march of Middle East facts.

*The attempt to subordinate Middle East reality to WCW, was compared by Prof. Elie Kedourie – who was a leading historian of the Middle East – to trying to make water run uphill.

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