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What accounts for today's historic peace deal? A lot of hard work, for sure. The enormous growth in Israeli economic, military, & demographic power over the last 20 years, definitely. But the key new ingredient is the Trump admin being guided by the right ideas. Short thread. 1/
Since before Israel’s founding, self-described foreign policy “realists” have been anti-Israel, or at least anti US-Israel alliance. Why be friends with the little guy when doing so angers the vastly larger majority in the region, and we need their oil? 2/
This began to change after the Six Day War, and accelerated in 1973 & the early 1980’s, when Israel proved itself a highly capable US client in the Cold War -- using US-supplied arms to defeat Soviet-armed and -trained Arab clients. This was very good for the US. 3/
A true realist would look at this as successful superpower-client alliance & offshore balancing: Israel keeps its region in check, promotes American interests, all at very low cost to the US. A little military aid and diplomatic support, no troops, no involvement in wars. 4/
But once the Cold War ended, this real realism was overtaken by sentimentalism masquerading as foreign policy. The peace process (which started at the Madrid Conference in 1991) and the Iran nuclear deal being two major examples. 5/
From 1991 to 2016, US-Israel relations revolved to a great extent around the Palestinian issue, giving politically-militarily weak (& anti-American) Pals huge influence over an alliance btwn the global & regional superpowers. This damage was self-inflicted by the US & Israel. 6/
It was a choice to pursue a mirage. It was presidential narcissism & misguided idealism clouding sober thinking. Also an example of Kissinger’s maxim: "When enough bureaucratic prestige has been invested in a policy, it is easier to see it fail than to abandon it.” 7/
What Trump did in very simple terms is remove the Pal veto over US-Israel relations. He offered them a seat at the table, they turned him down, and so he moved on. Arab states, fearful of Iran & attracted to a strong US-Israel regional order, are joining the alliance. 8/
There’s a simple foreign policy lesson here: reward your friends and punish your enemies, because then you’ll have more friends and fewer enemies. Trump understood this intuitively, and had the guts to ignore basically the entire DC foreign policy establishment to pursue it. 9/
This FP guild predicted over & over that war & violence would follow every realist foreign policy move. I don’t think they believed it, but they’ve been saying it for 30 years to protect their turf through intimidation and catastrophizing, and it's always worked. 10/
Obviously, they were wrong. States respect strength and seek alliances that offer security, order, and prosperity. A defining legacy of the Trump admin will be its willingness to defy this vacuous “expert” guild, to great and hopefully lasting success for the US & ME. end/
