Perhaps by now the leaders, starting with Netanyahu, have sobered up enough to realize that the deal of the century is a catastrophe for Israel, and a bonanza for the Palestinian Arabs.
It’s like waking up after a shotgun wedding when you ask yourself in startling despair…” what just happened?”
You gave away Jerusalem. That’s what happened.
No, just a second, you say…the plan is only talking about Abu Dis and environs, which are beyond the security barrier, as explained here, so it is not really Jerusalem per se, that they are being rewarded after a four-year wait to prove themselves neighborly and civilized and worthy. But will the PA settle for that alone? Of course not – as we’ve been hearing.
Yet they already have it in the books that like a tree grows in Brooklyn, a new Jerusalem is to grow nearby – competing Jerusalems? Dual, or even dueling capitals?
How quickly the Zionist Dream has been diminished, and make no mistake, the PA will ride the paperwork to hammer Israel for more concessions, with full support from the EU and UN.
Look, they will say, eventually, if not now, through acts of sovereignty, the Israelis are infringing on “our land.” Details, never mind.
After all, surely in the eyes of the international community, whether through gestures big or small, the Palestinian Arabs have been deputized as legitimate heirs to the Land.
The Deal of the Century does that, and so does a two-state solution, which used to be anathema to true Zionists.
Before moving on, I need to ask both Trump and Netanyahu, leaders I support and admire, if a Palestinian flag waving anywhere in Israel is anything but a rebuke?
Some, like these rabbis, view it as a distress signal, an abnegation of Jewish Law.
Israel still is a Jewish State as of this moment – correct? But I haven’t checked the latest headlines, and I’m afraid to look. Jewish leadership being what it is, you never know.
About that, the rabbis say it better than I did here and here, but I said it anyway, only to find myself outnumbered by the experts who say that the Palestinian Arabs won’t accept the deal anyway, so why worry. I worry. In one of those two columns, I mentioned that the letter is in the mail. I meant to say that the check is in the mail, which they can cash any time they want.
Already we read that the deal of the century is coming up in a few days at the UN Security Council, and that for the Arabs it’s no, as expected. So what?
The Europeans are already dancing with the plan, and feasting off its particulars.
From the UK swiftly comes a warning to Israel to forego applying sovereignty to Judea and Samaria. “Tut…tut..tut..we’re watching…behave…you’ve been given your orders.”
Overnight, the world is saying it’s the best deal the Palestinian Arabs will ever get; with no mention that it is the worst deal Israel ever got.
Nothing like it since (1920) the Boston Red Sox sold Babe Ruth to the New York Yankees.
Nor is it so terrific for the United States, which counts on Israel to be the only safe bet in the region, but would be so no more, sliced up from a population led by bickering terrorists.
But never mind. As for Israel, the vote is, yes. Two-state solution. Hear…Hear…Bloody marvelous.
In other words, Israel…the Netanyahu “right-wing” Government… is thrilled about a deal that CURTAILS Jewish settlements – Kushner says it’s his vision of the deal – and that through tunnels, highways and byways connects and ENLARGES Arab territory. Whoopee, Israel is prepared to argue at the UN.
Thank the president for his best intentions – and he is a true friend, and does mean well -- but file the deal of the century in the Suggestion Box, and let it stay there.
Is that what’s coming?
If so, that’s too bad. Because by now I’d expected the hierarchy of wheelers and dealers to have come around to their moment of clarity that they’ve been taken.
Like Maurice Kaplow in Philadelphia knew from the start. - and hello to you, Maury.
To those people, even to prime ministers and cabinet members, I had a suggestion to make. Nothing brilliant. Only to pretend that it never happened.
Thank the president for his best intentions – and he is a true friend, and does mean well -- but file the deal of the century in the Suggestion Box, and let it stay there.
Shelve it along with all the other deals that came down the pike across the decades.
Those too went nowhere and the stock market didn’t collapse.
Make like it never happened, old news, and tell the world that, just like the United States, Israel answers to nobody.
Wait. Is there time for another suggestion? That to keep things fair, just as Jews today are forbidden to live or visit any township designated “Palestinian,” all Arabs living in Israel must be removed, to join their brothers and sisters in the “Palestine” promised to them as a country in the future.
Was this brought up by Netanyahu and his team? Did “architect” of the deal Jared Kushner figure that in? Discuss.
New York-based bestselling American novelist Jack Engelhard writes regularly for Arutz Sheva.
He wrote the worldwide book-to-movie bestseller “Indecent Proposal,” and the authoritative newsroom epic, “The Bathsheba Deadline,” followed by his coming-of-age classics, “The Girls of Cincinnati,” and, the Holocaust-to-Montreal memoir, “Escape from Mount Moriah,” for which contemporaries have hailed him “The last Hemingway, a writer without peer, and the conscience of us all.” Website: www.jackengelhard.com
