#316: Finally, A Chance for Peace in the Middle East?

Finally, in the Middle East, there’s a chance for peace. Thanks to Trump.

So now finally there seems to be a chance for peace thanks to Trump. He has really invested time and energy in this. He did it in his first term already with the Abraham Accords.

Then October 7th happened, the gruesome attack by Hamas, the massacre of innocent Israelis, the kidnapping of hostages, unspeakable acts, all kinds of horrifying things. And of course, Israel’s response, a rather forceful response, too forceful in the minds of many. This has also created protests and all kinds of problems, not just for Israel, but also for Jewish people around the world because anti-Semitism has never been over.

So there was urgency to end this both for the sake of Israel and for the sake of Gaza. And the stumbling block of course was that Hamas still held hostages, dead and alive.

Finally today, all the living hostages were returned. This is now resulting in a ceasefire. There’s a Trump peace plan and now it depends on what’s going to go on and basically how Hamas reacts to this.

Trump has mobilized the entirety of his Abraham coalition and more. And his speech today sounded very optimistic. He’s trying to will this into being as is his style, and for now it seems to be working.

Now, of course, there are people who are unhappy, who might also be unwilling to grant Trump this victory. So, we have good news by the wrong person. That’s nuts. That is nuts.

No one is asking you to now love Trump. But I would like to say this whole idea of either loving Trump or hating Trump is not productive. It’s not democratic. He has democratically been elected president. There is no doubt about this. He is, if you’re American, your president, whether you like it or not.

Loving or hating a politician, that doesn’t get you anywhere. There are politicians whose positions I don’t like, whose demeanor I might not like, whose actions I might not like, but in a democratic society, hating them… There are politicians I like, whose actions I like and so on, but loving them? No.

This is not about your favorite sports team where you irrationally hang on to a losing team or whatever. This is not what this is like. This is not what it should be like. This is politics. This is democracy. We have to give credit where credit is due and criticize where criticism is due.

So I am really glad that Trump succeeded here because I want him to succeed for the US, the world, and me and all of us. This was the right thing to do. And let’s face it, he was probably the only one able to do this because whether you like him or not, he knows that politics is about power. Politics is about perception.

Yeah, he’s a showman. He has never hidden that. Obama was a showman, too. Good politicians are showmen. They get things done because they can create this perception around them that they can get it done.

So credit where credit is due. Good news is good news. We need to stop the hate. We can only come together if we realize that politics is politics.

Now everything is sounding a little bit louder because of social media bubbles. And yeah, Donald Trump is also a master in hyperbole. But we need to get this out of our system. We need to get this overstating of the facts, this partisan vitriol, this or what some people call Trump derangement syndrome. We need to get this under control. This is not our team versus their team. This is about country, about planet, about our future.

And if good things happen, they should happen. And we should applaud this and give this peace a chance.

Those who still shout “from the river to the sea” should understand, and I hope they don’t, but I hope they haven’t understood it yet because they’re still shouting it—because if they were understanding what they’re shouting, “from the river to the sea” means genocide of Jews. That’s what it means. This has to stop. Attacks on Jews, this has to stop.

We can’t have any of that if we want peace. And if this stuff continues, what does this tell us about these protests? Are they truly about peace? People in Gaza want peace. People in Palestine, in Israel want peace.

For peace to happen, it has to start in here. It has to start in our communication. It has to start in our spirit towards each other. We need to give this a chance and deescalate and come together.