This situation is intractable. The war has been going on for 10,000 years and will go on for another 10,000 years.

It is the worst kind of a fight, that of a family feud. It is important to remember that both historically and according to the Bible, the Arabs and the Jews are descended from the Prophet Abraham. The Jews descend from his son Isaac, and the Arabs descend from his son Ismail (Ishmael). They are cousins. They will never quit until one or the other is destroyed, and their temples or mosques pulled down and the ground on which they had been built sown with salt.

A senior member of the PLO that I had dinner with in Amman many years ago said something to me to explain the cause of the ongoing fighting and instability in the region, which I believe to be accurate. He said, “You have to remember that Islam is a young religion, and that it is only a thin veneer on the religious culture of the Middle East. The true religions of the region are the old pagan religions in which every city had its own god; every village had its own god, and every household had its own god. These gods were always competing with one another for supremacy and trying to trample the other gods into the dust. That is what is in the hearts of the people, and that is why they will always fight.”

#BeOpenClub