Nov 17, 2025
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Q. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) meets this week with President Trump. Is this a high point in US Middle East policy? Or is it overshadowed by the impact of parallel events little related to Riyadh?
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A. To the extent that agreements are reached regarding Riyadh joining the Abraham Accords and purchasing F-35 aircraft, this will certainly be a high point. For MbS, too, being received in the White House constitutes a kind of absolution for his 2018 brutal assassination of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
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But I would argue that the expansion of the US military presence in and around Israel and its constraining effect on Israeli freedom of strategic maneuver, coupled with its aggrandizing effect on US policy options, are of potentially far greater significance for Israel, the US and the Middle East.
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Lest we forget, President Trump campaigned on a pledge to distance the US from ‘foreign entanglements’. So far he appears to be doing the opposite. And his appetite is growing: from Kiryat Gat to Qatar; from Damascus to Gaza.
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Q. Not just in the Middle East. Trump has recently threatened to invade Venezuela and Nigeria . . .
A. Let’s leave aside other, non-Middle East arenas. The domestic reverberations for ‘America First’ are also a separate topic in terms of US presidential politics.
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Back in the Middle East, let’s start with Israel itself. We mentioned Kiryat Gat in southern Israel not far from the Gaza Strip, where the US military has set up its headquarters for Gaza. Note, not in Gaza itself, meaning Palestine, or in Egypt, but in Israel. There are also reports of a US military base being planned for Israel’s Gaza periphery region.
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US military personnel are also reportedly in northern Israel, facing the Lebanon (Hezbollah) and Syria arenas and coordinating with a US military headquarters unit in Beirut. The US is talking about building a base near Damascus in Syria in connection with Israel’s demands regarding demilitarization of southwest Syria as well as an apparent desire in Washington to ensure the stability of the new Damascus regime.
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These US military basing plans position the United States squarely in the middle of the Arab-Israel conflict: the Palestinian issue as centered in Gaza, Israel-Syria Golan tensions, and Israel’s unresolved conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon.
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Yossi Alpher's Death Tango: Ariel Sharon, Yasser Arafat and Three Fateful Days in March
"Anyone seeking to understand how Israelis and Palestinians traded the hopes of Oslo for something approaching hopelessness is well-advised to read this book. With penetrating analysis and elegant prose, Yossi Alpher has told the gripping story of three days nearly two decades ago that continue to haunt would-be peacemakers. Yossi’s faithful readers will not be disappointed with his latest effort."
Ambassador Frederic C. Hof, Bard College
"A riveting account of the crucial days in March 2002 when the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was profoundly changed for the worse. The peace camp has never recovered from those wrenching days, and we live now without any hope of a just settlement. Alpher is a highly respected expert who has spent decades studying this conflict from both sides."
Bruce Riedel, Director of the Brookings Intelligence Project
"A critical assessment of a key period in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict never before presented in such detail. The best and most capable players at the executive and political levels proved unable to forge any resolution, final or partial, because both parties continued to maintain an insurmountable gulf between themselves. This is a MUST read for anyone daring to tackle the future of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and of Israel-Arab relations in general."
Efraim Halevy, former Head of the Mossad (1998-2002)
Oraib Khader and Avi Bar-On are youngish Palestinian and Israeli bachelors with security experience, readiness to do business with one another, a shared fondness for women and money, and total cynicism about the lack of peace between their two peoples.
Oraib and Avi can never become true friends: the cultural and political gaps are too wide. But as they confront a failed peace process and a bleak peace future, they readily become business partners: shady business that exploits a lot of naïve international peace aspirations.
As Oraib sums up on a visit to Sarpsborg, Norway, where the ultimately-failed Oslo peace talks were held, “There is a lesson here for those who still doggedly and hopelessly pursue a two-state solution in the Middle East. Get smart. Get out of the Israeli-Palestinian peace business. Step back and let the Jews and Arabs screw one another while making money.”