Dear Rabbi Jacobs,
In your letter earlier today to Donald J. Trump and me, you state that you were “taken aback” by my comment that a “two state solution was an answer, but not the only answer,” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I am happy to engage in a discussion with you on the subject, which I believe is more detailed and complex than either your letter, or my response below, can do justice. Nonetheless, I am happy to offer some brief summaries of my views.
That a two-state solution has been a part of American foreign policy for some length of time – something you place great weight upon -- is, to me, entirely irrelevant. The wars in Vietnam and Iraq were also part of American foreign policy and I have no doubt that these were policies you opposed. As I’m sure you recognize, and as we witnessed this past week with the brutal murder of Hallel Ariel as she lay sleeping in her bed, followed the next day by the murder of Rabbi Michael Mark, a father of 10, the numerous proposals and initiatives for a two-state solution over the years have brought neither peace nor security to the State of Israel.
The issue confronting both the Israelis and the Palestinians is fundamentally humanitarian in nature. It is not political and it is not geographic. Both peoples are entitled to live in peace and dignity, and both peoples are being deprived of those fundamental rights because of one thing and one thing only – radical Islamic jihadism, a cancer that infects Israel and much of the rest of the world. No re-allocation of land will cure this scourge, and, indeed, Israel knew no peace from 1948 to 1967 when it did not even control Judea and Samaria...