By Rivkah Rothschild, Esq.

They object because these areas are strategically and politically vital to Israel. The heartland is vital to Israel’s future security in the region. The battle for who is the rightful heir of Avraham, a spiritual war, is being fought on the level of who is sovereign over Judea and Samaria, over Jerusalem, and who can pray on the temple mount.

ISRAEL LOSES EVEN WHEN SHE WINS

Every time Israel wins a war against its enemy attackers, and wants to turn that war into a victory march, the Arab countries cry foul. Israel can fight and win, but must turn the win into a loss in the aftermath of battle, so much so that the enemy characteristically proclaims itself the victor. 

A real win means a loss of strategic territory, such that the enemy is impoverished in some meaningful way by either a loss of territory rich in minerals or oil, or a loss of a mountain range that bestows tactical leverage during a war, or the loss of a port important to its commercial interests. Without a loss of something of significance in the language of nationhood, the war leaves in place the status quo. But the status quo is what led to a war.  If the status quo led to a war, the return to the status quo will surely lead to yet another war. And history repeats itself. For Israel, “again and again” has garnered a whole new meaning.

Why can’t Israel understand the above, such a simple corollary? It is true that every time Israel starts down the path of declaring sovereignty over the territory of its vanquished enemy, the world erupts into a wave of vitriol, complete with threats, boycotts and embargoes. For a painful moment, for which I apologize, here is a synopsis: i. we withdrew from the Sinai in 1957, returned it again after the Six Day War, and formally relinquished control in 1982; ii. after the Yom Kippur War we gave back parts of the Sinai and the Golan Heights; iii. in 1994, at the end of Intifada I, we gave the Palestinian Authority (“PA”) Gaza City and Jericho; iv. in 1995 we gave the PA land and major cities in Judea and Samaria; v. in 2000 at Camp David we offered most of Judea and Samaria, and Gaza, to the PA, which was rejected and set off Intifada II; vi. in 2005, we gave up 21 settlements and land in Gaza, which ended up in the hands of Hamas; vii. In 2008 we offered most of Judea and Samaria, with a link to Gaza, to the PA, which was rejected. In short, theoretical “land for peace” has really been “land for renewed and the same or greater existential threats.” 

THE SCRIPT WE FOLLOW ISN’T WORKING

How can a small country in a dangerous region, highly dependent on the support of the one superpower that has its back at the UN – and is its primary supplier of ordinance – not bend its knee to the demands of the Western and Moslem world and stand its ground? I truly don’t know how it can, and perhaps it can’t, as history has shown up until now. I, for one, am not advising that Israel choose further isolation, condemnation, and recrimination, with the very real threats of arms embargos, arrests of its highest government officials, curtailment of trade agreements, and boycotts from international competitions and collaborations, just to mention some of the economic and political coercion Israel has traditionally been subjected too, and during the last five months at levels unimagined by even the most sanguine analyst of realpolitik. But on the other hand, can Israel afford to keep replaying the same old script with the same dire outcomes in the aftermath of the multi-front wars it has just won? 

WHAT ARE OUR ENEMIES GOALS

The first step toward coming to the right answer to this question is the proper analysis of the situation. This requires Israel to understand the goals, mission, and agenda of her enemies. 

The unreformed Arab countries have the following goals: 

  • • keeping Israel as the focus of its indigenous populations; 
  • • keeping the Islamist fervor to subdue infidels that the Koran encourages, if not demands, intact; and
  • • keeping alive the theocratic ideal of its populations regarding Islam, which ideal is that Islam, as the superior and supreme religion, is to be installed in all parts of the Middle East as a harbinger to its installation the world over. 

This agenda is evident, openly or subtly, in every war Israel has been forced to fight against its Islamic neighbors, yet somehow, for some reason, time and time again, Israel seeks to redress the vanquished after roundly defeating them. How is it possible that Israel does not learn that appeasement doesn’t work in her favor, in the long term, because it allows the enemy to hold onto the above agenda? 

THE ABRAHAM ACCORDS BENEFIT ISRAEL SHORT-TERM BUT NOT LONG-TERM

I am aware that the White House is currently using a very enticing carrot to thwart Israel’s efforts to make the necessary historic moves that undermine the Arab world’s mission. This is the Abraham Accords. 

The Abraham Accords benefit Trump, but not Israel, in the long term, while benefitting both in the short term. Trump wishes to create a legacy as a peace maker and ruler-savior, resolving world crises that no one else would even confront, must less successfully resolve. This is a short term goal, one that must be accomplished in a total of four years, with only three remaining. 

Trump is quite a dynamo and with his pastor, Paula White, by his side at the White House he is fully determined to use his power and position to have his name enshrined in the history books along with the likes of leaders such as Alexander the Great, Julius Ceasar, Churchill and perhaps Reagan, whose slogans he has borrowed. 

Trump will keep driving home the message he wants every US and Israeli citizen to embrace: In just eight months he has solved more wars than any single human being from the dawn of civilization. He tells us at every opportunity that he has even resolved hatred and enmity between nations at it for 3,000 years, and only the greatest of deal makers could successfully tackle such long lasting, hot and dangerous conflicts. 

Trump wants not just me and you to understand this, he wants the whole world to get on board and recognize his heroism, i.e., a leader unparalleled in history, and a man of deep conviction that saved the world from self-destruction. Trump sees himself as the savior-ruler that ushers in the rule of law and the blessings of G-d Almighty in every region.

For Israel, this isn’t bad at all in the short term. If Trump can forge a peace agreement and instill fear in the hearts of her sworn enemies and get them to back off for the next three years, well, who wouldn’t welcome that paradigm in the Middle East? Trump keeps telling us that if he were the 46th President instead of Biden, the war in Gaza would never have happened. He is likely right, since his peace through strength slogan really means, ‘Do what I say or encounter my wrath’, which wrath is backed up by a fleet of B-2’s, among other sophisticated weaponry, which is highly intimidating to most bullying countries. They’ve met their match.

But where does that leave Israel once the world leader is no longer residing at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW and fear of his wrath is no more. Israel has not even once roundly humiliated her enemies and sent the message to their populations that their theology will not one day reign supreme, not in the Middle East, not in the West, and not in the world. Israel has not conveyed the message that they can never succeed in their goal to be sovereign over the land of Israel, rule Jerusalem, and successfully bar Jews from worshiping on the temple mount. 

The Trump 20 Point Comprehensive Plan to End the Gaza Conflict (“20 Point Plan”) promotes Trump, which we may not mind in the slightest, or we may find mildly amusing when he takes a little too much credit on our backs, but it does nothing for Israel’s long-term security, safety and economic stability. 

THE HARSH REALITY FACING ISRAEL

Let’s face the harsh reality: The Arab countries don’t want Israel to be sovereign over Judea and Samaria for the reason that they want it to morph into a Palestinian state. They want the Palestinian state to one day defeat its sworn enemy, the Jewish state, and take over its territory. Preventing Israeli sovereignty is just the first prophylactic measure in this not so hidden agenda if you talk to the man on the street, but glossed over when meeting with Arab politicians. I am sorry to say that I am certain that most, if not all of the Arab states, even those that are behind the 20 Point Plan, are not interested in other than short term co-existence and peace with Israel. 

It is Trump and not the Arab states who is heralding “the end of an age of terror and death, and the beginning of the age of faith and hope and of G-d”, as he told the Knesset on October 13, 2025. He mentioned that he must quickly exit to a summit in Sharm El Sheikh at which almost all of the Arab countries in the Middle East and the Indo-Pacific, as well as many Western countries, were represented. The United States, Qatar, Egypt and Turkey signed Trump’s Presidential Memorandum calling for peace, the outlawing of extremism and radicalization, and the regional integration of Israel. It was announced in the media that Prime Minister Netanyahu was invited to the summit, however, since it took place close to Shemini Atzeret, it appears that it may have been scheduled at a time that Bibi could not attend. Furthermore, on October 14, 2025, a senior Turkish official confirmed that Turkey’s President Recep Erdoğan had blocked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from attending the summit by threatening to boycott it if Netanyahu attended. So much for peace and regional integration. 

If regional integration was truly being embraced by Israel’s Arab neighbors, they would not oppose, but would agree to sovereignty over Israel’s heartland. It wouldn’t be ‘Israel must give up rights to land for peace’. It would be, ‘the victor takes the spoils in exchange for accepting the surrender of the enemy’, which is what is expected and accepted everywhere in the world. 

AFTER TRUMP IS GONE, THEN WHAT

Israel must look over the horizon to the days after January 2029. Trump is no longer in the While House. The next president may be more like Biden than Trump because he lacks the evangelical underpinnings that make Trump a lover of Israel, akin to Ambassador Huckabee, encouraged by his personal Pastor Paula White, even as he bends his knee to Qatari dictates in the chess game of gaining leverage across the Middle East and in the Indo-Pacific. 

It could very well be JD Vance, who showed his true colors on October 23, 2025 when the Knesset passed the first reading of a bill to extend Israeli law to Judea and Samaria, a first step to declaring sovereignty, rhetorically stating that it was a “very stupid political stunt”.

If ever there was a verbal moment of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, this was it. Even if the bill was proposed by the opposition rather then the coalition, Israel’s aspirations to be sovereign over its heartland and have full and meaningful security control over the areas from which Hamas and the other death cults still try to launch their gruesome and heinous acts of terrorism – the more gruesome the greater glory in their culture and the higher the compensation –  to be called a ‘stupid political stunt’ is a treacherous, obtuse statement. JD Vance then self-righteously proclaims that he “personally take[s] some insult to it”. Little JD can’t bear to witness Israel flexing her muscles at her enemies and their newly minted Western supporters, Canada, France and Australia, particularly on his watch.

YOU WANT AN ALLY SOMETIMES; OTHER TIMES YOU WANT A VASSAL

Just the day before, Vance proudly proclaimed that “[w]e don’t want in Israel a vassal state, and that’s not what Israel is. We want a partnership, we want an ally.” And Bibi echoed these sentiments the following week when he told the members of the Shin Bet that “President Trump and his entire immediate team . . . want a strong and independent Israel, one that is capable of defending itself . . . and when Israel is protecting itself, it also protects the whole area.” 

I have news for the Vice-President, and then for Bibi. You, Mr. Vice President, want an ally when Israel controls the skies of Iran, making it possible for your seven B-2’s to swoop in and drop 14 bombs for a shining, text-book worthy military feat. And you want an ally when Israel provides you with high-stakes intelligence and advanced cyber technology. But you want a vassal when Israel votes in her own democratically elected Knesset to further her strategic military and political agenda in Judea and Samaria. You want a vassal state whenever Israel’s plans clash with Trump’s ambitions to control large swaths of the world as a benevolent ruler with a powerful army, an extensive nuclear arsenal, and an avenging personality. Bibi must realize that Trump and some of his immediate team want him to do exactly as they dictate, regardless of what Israel’s independent security interests demand. They are quite pleased for the IDF and the IAF to decimate Iran and Jihadist Hamas, which agrees with their foreign policy agenda and allows their plans for the Middle East to move ahead, but they are not okay with Israel doing the victory march if it upsets Qatar, Saudi Arabia or the Emirates and risks derailing any of the deals with those countries. Turkey as well. 

TIME TO CHANGE THE SCRIPT

My hope is that we as a nation come to internalize the following simple truth: we cannot keep doing what doesn’t work. No more engaging with the cacophony of countries’ voices duplicitously saying what we can and can’t do and what disingenuous international legal standards we have violated, which is all a cynical game to allow them to eventually accomplish their theocratic, Islamist agenda. We must stop denying that our enemies want to hold us back so they can establish a state, not to have peace with us, but to destroy us when the time is ripe. Just reread the above regarding Erdogan’s blocking Israel from attending the peace conference in Egypt. With respect to the so-called “peace” conference, the war-mongering Erdogan was appeased, and he prevailed. Appeasement of the JD Vance’s of the world, our politician frenemies, as well as our Turkish and Qatari Al Jazeera-supporting enemies, has never worked to our long-term benefit. 

WE NEED BETTER BOUNDARIES WITH RESPECT TO OUR FRIENDS

We need to push back as well on President Trump when he steps over the line, transforming from the Trump that is benevolently providing us with policy suggestions and ordinance, to the Trump that is dictatorially encroaching on our sovereignty. He does so, of course, for our own good, such as when he met with Qatar, Jordan, Turkey, Pakistan, Indonesia, Egypt, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia on September 23, 2025 and gave his word that we will not declare sovereignty over our heartland.

Consider what Trump told Time magazine regarding the bombings we carried out in Doha, as much as he condemned Israel for carrying them out, in his October 15, 2025 interview: “This was one of the things that brought us all together, because it was so out of joint that it sort of got everybody to do what they have to do.” 

In other words, without bombs blowing up a building in Doha, aimed at Hamas leaders, there would still be hostages in the tunnels of Gaza and no ceasefire. In other words, those bombs were what lit a fire under the throne of the Qatari ruling family.

Also consider what Trump told us in his monumental speech to the Knesset on the day that the 20 hostages came home:

  • • “So Israel, with our help . . . you’ve won.  . . .[n]ow you are [going to] unleash … success the likes of which Israel has never been able to think of because you’re so firm, and you should be, and you’ve done the right thing in defending yourself.” 

And we need to continue doing the right thing by defending ourselves, which includes making our heartland, Judea and Samaria, our land. 

Trump informed us that If we are strong, assertive and innovative, he and his country will support us. He implied, perhaps unintentionally, that if we are weak and unassertive, if we allow ourselves to be lulled or bullied once again into submission to his or others’ dictates with the false lure of “regional integration” via the Abraham Accords, instead of protecting our borders, our communities, and forcefully asserting our national interests, he will abandon us. He claims otherwise, but that is bluster, and we see it whenever our national interests clash with his goals as the world’s foremost deal maker.

As he told us, plain and simple:

“The State of Israel is strong . . . [a]nd that is why Israel will always remain a vital ally of the United States of America . . . [you] field one of the world’s most powerful militaries . . . [a]nd have one of the most innovative economies on earth.”

If we are strong, assertive and innovative, the Trumps of the world and their countries will support us. 

It’s time to begin anew, using a new script, humming a new tune, and achieving a new outcome.