Dear Mayor Buttigieg,
I have been very impressed with your statements and demeanor during your presidential run. You have all the attributes we need in a president. I sincerely hope that your support continues to grow and that Americans will elect you to be a President who we can be proud of.
The only issue with which I disagree is your stance on Israel. Your position is basically that Netanyahu’s aggressive settlement construction makes it impossible to create a two state peace solution. This has been the Democratic Party’s position for years, and it is a position that with respect for the Democratic Party is based on the deliberate rejection of fact.
Here is the real truth. The Creation of a Jewish state on land that the Arabs claim is theirs is a catastrophe for Arab pride. No peace, no recognition and no negotiations are possible until the Arabs assuage the shame. This can only be accomplished if Israel is defeated in battle. You will remember that in 1972, Egypt first had to defeat Israel in battle before it could negotiate a peace treaty.
Since the likelihood of Israel suffering a military defeat is low, the only way the Arabs can wage a successful war is to delegitimize Israel in international organizations and academia, The Palestinian Arabs are doing very well with this war, but getting people to support their story is not as satisfying as leveling Tel Aviv.
Part of the delegitimization is to deny any Jewish connection with the land and to convince the world that Palestinians are victims of Jewish aggression. It seems to me that a historical villain once said that if you repeat something often enough, people will believe it.
This is not a religious struggle but a cultural struggle. The Palestinian Arab shame based culture makes it impossible for its people to negotiate with an entity that has occupied it and will therefore never live with the shame of a Jewish state. This is why the Palestinian Arabs have refused all Israeli offers for peace, many that you will remember were enabled by the assistance of American presidents, and that explains why Yasser Arafat walked from a deal he signed with Bill Clinton and Yitzhak Rabin. Arafat told Clinton he would not last a week if he signed a peace agreement with Israel.
Mayor Pete, it ought not take courage to have a Mideast policy based on truth, and with respect, simply supporting the Palestinian victimization narrative reflects poorly on those who ignore the truth.
The irony is that we Democrats oppose President Trump for being untruthful, but many in our ranks by uncritically accepting the Palestinian victim narrative are ourselves divorced from the truth.
Respectfully yours,
Lawrence C. Shapiro,