President Trump, now to the ‘Deal of the Millennium’…

President Trump,

Many congratulations on your historic re-election as president of the United States. Whatever one’s perspective, few would argue it’s been one of the greatest ever political comeback stories.

The Abraham Accords that you negotiated were a set of truly groundbreaking achievements. They reshaped the Middle East and confounded the many critics who said it couldn’t be done. Your re-ascension to the presidency brings a new dawn to the region.

But there’s unfinished business. It’s time to clinch ‘the Deal of the Century’. 

It’s time to end the conflict between Israel, the Palestinians and the wider Arab-Islamic world. And it’s time to lay the foundation for durable peace under a US-led framework.

In fact, let’s call it the ‘Deal of the Millennium’, because that’s what it would be.

After the success of the Abraham Accords, it will again take a Donald Trump to go beyond the groupthink behind one hundred years of failed diplomacy. And it will again take a Donald Trump to end the futility of a failed solution, one which manufactures its own bottlenecks by outlawing the hopes and dreams of those on all sides to the conflict.

As not only the architect of the Abraham Accords, but also the author of ‘the Art of the Deal’, I speak humbly to you with my suggestion.

The key to the deal is to make everyone happy, to give everyone the outcome they want – a maximalist deal which fulfils peoples’ hopes and dreams, gives everyone the platform to declare victory, to feel that the struggles and sacrifices were not in vain, to turn their attention not to fighting more war but rather to building a new peace.

What does making everyone happy look like?

For America, it means a peaceful and prosperous Middle East. A Middle East that’s no longer a drain on US resources and a distraction for US foreign policy. Rather, a Middle East that’s a stable, successful and self-reliant partner for diplomacy, trade and investment that will drive American growth, American jobs, American exports and renewed American leadership.

For the Arab Middle East, it means an integrated regional bloc, the old pan-Arabist dream, incorporating the three most important Islamic holy places and the entirety of the Palestinian territories, one that achieves the vision of a modern forward-looking Arabia and Levant by harnessing Gulf resources, Israeli innovation, and Arab industriousness.

For religious Jews, and all those who look to scripture, to the prophets, for inspiration, it means one sovereign Jewish realm covering the entire biblical Land with Jerusalem as its eternal undivided capital and, G-d willing, the Jewish people once more established across our entire ancestral home.

For secular Jews, it means a fully civil Jewish State of Israel inside the 1967 borders with Jerusalem as its capital, an open, inclusive, prosperous, secure and democratic society, at peace with its neighbours, and at peace with itself.

For secular Arabs, it means a Palestinian state inside the 1967 borders, with Jerusalem as its capital, with self-determination, dignity, freedom and equality for all Palestinians, with an established right of return across the whole land, and with integration into the wider Arab world.

To the failed diplomats of the past, this is a bag of irresolvable contradictions. But to a President whose art is deal-making, who’s trusted by the key players, who has the drive to make things happen and to fulfil his promises, with G-d’s help this is not only possible, it’s also a quick win. (Scan below to previous blogposts for more details…)