Clifford May is right to highlight Israel’s mounting security challenges, nearly all of which emanate from Iran (“Israel faces intensifying external threats and internal divisions,” web, Aug. 16).
Tehran’s terrorist proxies seek to wrap themselves, snakelike, around the Jewish state.
But two contributing factors must be noted: the “peace process cartel” in the West and a mainstream media plagued by amnesia.
The former, composed mostly of former diplomats, has spent decades arguing that Israel must first surrender land to achieve peace with its enemies.
This may have worked with the late Egyptian leader Anwar Sadat, but it has failed with the Palestinian and Iranian leaders who seek not an accord, but Israel’s destruction.
Israel has offered the Palestinians a state on numerous occasions, including in 2000 at Camp David, in 2001 at Taba and in 2008 after the Annapolis Conference. All were met with rejection.
And Israeli withdrawals from the West Bank in the 1990s and southern Lebanon in 2000 have only emboldened terrorist groups such as Hezbollah and Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
The results are in: These policies failed. But that hasn’t stopped the cartel from continuing to advocate a failed formula.
Nor has it stopped legacy press outlets from treating them as “experts” while often omitting this relevant history.
SEAN DURNS
Senior research analyst
Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis
(Note: A slightly different version of this letter appeared in the Washington Times in print on Aug. 19, 2023)