Understanding the Mayhem of the Middle East

The past year has brought dramatic changes to the Middle East, overturning long-standing assumptions about geopolitics, terrorism, and the prospects for peace. As the war unfolds, our panelists from the Z3 Conference bring different perspectives on what so many decision-makers, experts, and commentators got wrong and what the future holds for the most volatile region on earth.

About Our Moderator & Panelists:

Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib is an American writer and analyst who grew up in Gaza City, having left in 2005 as a teenage exchange student to the United States. He writes extensively on Gaza’s political and humanitarian affairs and has been an outspoken critic of Hamas and a promoter of coexistence and peace as the only path forward between Palestinians and Israelis. Alkhatib is a resident senior fellow with the Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative at the Atlantic Council’s Middle East Programs. He has a bachelor’s degree in business administration and a master’s in intelligence and national security studies. His writing has been published in US and Israeli outlets, and his opinions and comments have been featured in the international press.

Prof. Chanan Tigay is Editor-in-Chief of J. The Jewish News of Northern California; author of The Lost Book of Moses: The Hunt for the World's Oldest Bible (HarperCollins), winner of the Anne & Robert Cowan Writers Prize and finalist for the Sami Rohr book prize; and is an associate professor at San Francisco State University, where he serves as chair of the Creative Writing Department. Among other postings, Tigay has covered the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from the Jerusalem bureau of Agence France-Presse; 9-11 and the church abuse scandals for AFP’s New York bureau; the anthrax attacks and Ground Zero recovery work for United Press International; and the United Nations for The Jerusalem Report magazine.

Maggie Feldman-Piltch makes national security make sense. She is the National Security Fellow at the Wilson Center's Science and Technology Innovation Program (STIP) and creator of Non-State Actress, a multi-media project with an audience of more than 250,000 in its first year. She has more than a decade of experience across the national security and defense apparatus, working on projects for the Departments of Defense, State, and Homeland Security and partnering with the Department of Treasury, and several federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies. In addition to her own platforms, Maggie’s analysis and contributions appear on CNBC, NPR, PBS, Sinclair Media and around the world on NOVA and CNN International and in Teen Vogue, Forbes, Foreign Policy, and Latin American Advisor.

Nadav Eyal is one of Israel's most prominent journalists and a winner of the Sokolov Award—Israel's equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize. He writes columns for Yediot Ahronot and Ynet, Israel's most widely circulated newspaper and news website, respectively. Beginning on October 7, 2023, he has focused his work on stories and analyses related to the massacres perpetrated in Israel and the subsequent war in Gaza and the northern border of Israel, including reporting multiple times from the field. He also serves as a senior commentator for Channel 12, one of Israel's two commercial channels. Eyal authored the bestseller "REVOLT, the Worldwide Uprising Against Globalization," which was published in 2021 by Ecco HarperCollins (USA) and Picador (UK), and has been translated into multiple languages, including Korean, Thai and Chinese.

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Video Transcript

Chanan Tigay: Hi, everybody. Good afternoon. Very happy to see you here. Hope you all enjoyed lunch. My name is Chanan Tigay. I'm the editor in chief of J, the Jewish News of Northern California. And we're really thrilled to be a media sponsor of Z3 because this conference really is like the embodiment of what we try to do on our pages.

Really interesting, important conversations that need to happen for the Jewish people. With that said, I will briefly introduce our panel and then just get right into it. Sitting at the far end of the stage here is Mr. Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, resident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council. He's a former Bay Area resident, but is now decamped to our nation's capital.

Miss Maggie Feldman Piltch is a national security fellow at the Wilson Center, also in our nation's capital. Welcome. And Nadav Eyal is a journalist from Yediot Achronot, and YNet in Israel, currently teaching at Columbia University. All right. We've got applause already. This should be easy.

I had a first question planned and then as we were walking up onto the stage Nadav said, hey, there's been a development in what's going on between Israel, Lebanon, and Hezbollah. He's got a regional source who is informing him on his phone almost as we speak. And Nadav, can you tell us what indeed is happening right now that is making news?

Nadav Eyal: First, thank you. And I'm so happy to be here. At the Z3, it's the first time I've been at this conference specifically. It's not my first time at this JCC. So Israel and Hezbollah through mediators are in constant negotiations that would be lasting for a few weeks in order to reach a ceasefire in the North.

And this has advanced substantially because of Israel's, military success against Hezbollah high command. And right now the bottom line is that it seems that Hezbollah has answered according to Lebanese media sources positively to Amos Hochstein's initiative as to a ceasefire with Israel. Now this is what both Lebanese media sources and my own regional sources are saying that Hezbollah has done.

But in the region, you can always say yes, but. And, the truth here and it's, everything is in the pudding or in the details and then you need to really see what kind of response they are sending. But basically, according to these sources, it's not a substantial change, nothing that is beyond minimal phrasing issues or this is how the Lebanese want to present it.

Amos Hochstein has said that he's not going to travel to the region unless He can actually get an agreement. He has a scheduled tour. He's coming on Tuesday to Lebanon, and then on Wednesday to Israel. And if everything falls in the right place, we might have an agreement this week.

Chanan Tigay: Much has transpired since October 7th. The war persists, the hostages have still not come home.

The human toll in Gaza continues to rise. So I want to ask each of you, given your different backgrounds and your different areas of focus in your careers, is this moment different than other moments of peril in the Middle East? And if so, why? And Ahmed, if you can start, please.

Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib: Certainly. Thanks again for having me here.

And I want to acknowledge my own bias as somebody who grew up in Gaza, who has family in Gaza, who has lost dozens of immediate and extended family there, and who currently am I my brother and what remains of my family are still on the ground. I was able to get some of them out. We're from northern Gaza.

Some of my family made it to the south. Some of them remain up north. That said, the reason why I'm saying that is for me, I very much I'm immersed in this issue, not just as an analytical exercise, not just as an intellectual or academic or a national security topic, but one that, that heavily impacts me personally.

So with that said, I think this is radically different. I think right before October 7th, the Middle East was indeed going through a realignment whereby the Israel and Palestine conflict, while present, while deadly, was not exactly the main driving force of geopolitical events. There was a realignment among many Arab nations to be closer directly and indirectly with Israel as part of an effort to combat the Islamic Republic of Iran and the emerging nuclear threat.

Iran may not have made a decision to become a nuclear armed state, but that decision, the gap between when that decision is made and when that becomes a reality has been shrinking and shrinking ever since the end of the GCPOA, the Iran nuclear deal. And so this was very much so part of Hamas's calculus.

As time goes on, I was tracking events leading up to October 7th, like the possibility of Saudi Israeli rapprochement and normalization of relations, like the fact that I had sources in Gaza in June of 2023 that said the Qataris were about to cut off The monthly funding to Hamas, and we found out that in September of 2023, Mr.

Netanyahu sent David Barnea , the head of Mossad, to Doha and basically asked the Qataris to please keep this going. There were the protests, mass protests against Hamas in July and August of 2023, similar to the protests that took place in 2019 and in 2017. And so Hamas was facing a dead end. It was facing a wall, a brick wall, it along its allies in the axis of resistance.

And so this was very much so an effort to disrupt this regional realignment. The question that I The question that I regularly think of is, will the end of the war in Gaza, will the end of the war in Lebanon and the bringing down of the temperature and the ending of the attacks against Israel by Shia militias, by the Houthis, and vice versa.

Will that allow for the re continu re continuation, re establishment of that realignment, particularly in the light, in light of an incoming Trump administration?

Chanan Tigay: Yeah, thank you.

Maggie Feldman-Piltch: It's a good question. I can certainly tell you that probably prior to last year, or at least prior to the year before that, if you had this panel, I would not be on it.

And I say that because up until quite recently, this was not my bag as Millennials say. I live in Washington. It's a blessing and a curse. I am surrounded by many people who know many things. And I can give you a list of 50 people, overwhelmingly women who are national security experts with unrivaled expertise in the Middle East.

I am not on that list. So why am I on this panel? And why do I have, all of your attention, I hope? Because my expertise is hopefully making any of this make sense. And so what started to happen over the last year somehow I still know people outside of Washington, many of them I'm mostly just related to at this point who had questions on anything as specific as what's a THAAD missile, in which point you tell them, no, you mean missile defense system different.

What is the difference between Hezbollah and Hamas? I think, and tell me if I'm losing the thread here, either one of you how is this different now than before? Something that sticks out to me, in addition to everything you've said, which I agree with to a certain extent we talk about the war in Israel as if it is one war, and you made an important distinction that, Is important.

There is a war in Gaza. There is a war in Lebanon. The war in Lebanon is functionally, structurally Ingrediently different than that in Gaza. I cannot imagine a time, at least in my lifetime, not that long I get, where fighting Hezbollah would be something people could get upset about, right? The Marine Corps barracks bombings are a core part of my intergenerational trauma, as for many other national security professionals.

And the fact that we are at a point where we think of what is happening in Israel as one front and one conflict, it's not, and I guess I'll. Pause after saying, I think this has a lot to do with what hopefully is your later question about chess boards, right? How has all of this gotten tied together differently?

I think a great deal of it comes down to technology and I don't just mean drones and fad missile defense systems. I think it comes down to the technology we use and don't use. in the most simple ways of how we communicate with each other. There was a point made that nuance is boring and misinformation is easier.

I fundamentally disagree. Nuance is so interesting, and if no one finds you cost, you're boring.

Chanan Tigay: Interesting. Nadav, how does this moment differ from prior moments of conflict?

Nadav Eyal: First and foremost, it's Israel's most, and the region's, most severe war since 1948. You can't compare it even with 1973.

Now, it might not be as important strategically, like 1967, like the Six Days War, but probably it is. So this is, first and foremost, the deadliest conflict that the Middle East has seen between Israel and some of its neighbors. It's not the deadliest conflict in the Middle East, of course. Because the Syrian civil war cost many more lives and the Iraq war cost many more lives, The repercussions of the Iraq war, but this is the most deadly conflict that Israel has been engulfed with Actually since its inception and this is first and foremost makes it a very different story Secondly, it's the first time in Israel's history since 1948 in which its adversaries Actually had the idea That they might be able to again extinguish Israel's resilience and survival in the region in the long term.

So sometimes the way that the Yom Kippur War in 1973 is being presented is as though in 1973 Sadat and Hafez al Assad, the father of The current ruler of Syria thought that they might destroy Israel. We know that this is not the fact. We know that it was their strategic aim to change the phases in the Middle East, but they didn't really hope to destroy Israel at that point.

They were well aware that, I should say as an Israeli, according to foreign sources, Israel has nuclear weapons, and that would be impossible. But now, with these massacres and this attack by Hamas and the flood of Al Aqsa as Yahya Sinwar, the the leader of Hamas at the time, now deceased has cleared it.

The way that this call was meant to the region was that there would be, indeed, a flood. Arab countries will disconnect their relations with Israel. You will have a third intifada. Hezbollah will join arms to Hamas. This was the plan and will initiate attacks in the north, including a full blown invasion.

And you will have also attacked by the Iranians and the Houthis. And again, together with this intifada in the West Bank, that would have might have led Israel into a very difficult spot and very quickly. And the point about this is it should have been made. Really fast. And until we would have woken up and started really fighting the good fight, the meaning of that would be a total change in Israel's position in the region.

And even at the beginning of the war, when it was obvious that the plan didn't work out, in the sense that Hezbollah did not join as they expected, Iran did not join as they expected, and so forth, although they did join. It was still a narrative, and maybe still is flowing through the region, that somehow Israel is temporary.

And the fact that this has entered the atmosphere of the Middle East is the biggest change that we have seen in the last 50 years, and I think to a large extent this was extinguished by the operations of the IDF and the Mossad since the beginning of the war.

Chanan Tigay: Almost exactly two months from today, Donald Trump will become president of the United States again.

And I'm curious, and Ahmed, if we could start with you here, what do you think the implications of a second Trump administration are for Israel, but also for the Middle East more broadly?

Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib: It's precisely Mr. Trump's lack of unpredictability that makes it really difficult to foretell what's ahead.

But what we, there's a belief among many that there will be a Trump 2. 0 presidency, if you will. Some people say that'll mean less chaos and more precision. Some people say that The fact that this is his last administration, if you will, that he might have a different incentive structure than he did the first time around.

We know that through his selection of some of the folks in his cabinet, Obviously, the most prominent being Mr Huckabee for U. S. Ambassador to Israel. That doesn't bode well for Palestinian aspirations for statehood, for peace, for just existing, continuing to exist as a sovereign, independent body that is not fully or partially absorbed by the state of Israel.

And Huckabee's remarks on Basically, then saying that there is no such thing as the West Bank and that the entirety of Judea and Samaria and the whole settlement enterprise are legitimately part of Israel and should be acknowledged as such formally. So that's going to put the Palestinians in a difficult spot.

I think Trump sold many Arab and Muslim constituencies in the United States that he and he alone could rapidly end the war in Gaza. It remains to be seen. I've talked to folks. on the periphery of the Trump of Mr. Trump. And there really is no specific detail as to how that will be executed.

We see the Netzerim Corridor in Gaza, in central Gaza, being constructed and expanded to now ex include almost something like 17 to 20 percent. of the territory. We see the Philadelphia corridor along Gaza's borders with Egypt. There's talks of even more ongoing demilitarized zone along the border.

And it appears that the IDF is positioning itself to be there for the foreseeable future. And can there be an end of the war with permanent Israeli presence? While That has not been answered by Mr. Trump. The last thing is I think the main players with with regard, the main potential winners of a Trump presidency are the Saudis.

Over the next couple of years, the Republicans control the Congress and that could provide an opportunity to push through a mutual defense. between the Saudis and the United States, something that has been in the works and in the talks for many years. And so the Saudis could either stand by their position with Mr.

Trump, that we want the pri, the price for normalizing with Israel will entail this irrever, irreversible pathway towards a Palestinian state or the Saudis looking out for their own interests and getting us, support and protection against Iran in accessing a civilian nuclear reactor for their power generation may very well backtrack on their insistence that normalizing relations with Israel be paralleled with this with the Palestinian state.

So that's I think what is most important to look out for is how Mr. Trump's elections not only impacts the Palestinians and the Potential for two state solution and the ending of the war, which I view as short and medium term issues, but how that bolsters or freezes the expansion of the Abraham Accords.

Yeah, Maggie.

Maggie Feldman-Piltch: So I'm going to say the least popular thing in Washington, which is I do not know. And I think I, there are two reasons why I do not know. One is we do not live in a vacuum, whomever the president is. There are other people involved in national and international security matters, and most certainly there are other people involved in what goes on in the Middle East besides one individual in the United States.

I'm not trying to say that who the President of the United States is does not matter. The point I'm trying to make leads to the second reason why I'm going to say I do not know. The National Security Apparatus, which includes a great deal of different departments and agencies, overwhelmingly is staffed by career individuals.

These are, as I mentioned, that list of 50 mostly women who know a lot about Israel. Political appointees are important, and in many cases they are the senior leadership at places like the State Department. The Director of National Intelligence is a political appointee. And yes, it is true that President elect Trump has made suggestions of who his nominees will be for some of these roles.

We don't, I, if, and please correct me if I'm wrong, I think you're most likely to know these nominees have not been received by the Senate yet, therefore they are not official and none of them have been confirmed. There is a lot of process in Washington. That is not a political statement or my personal opinion, that is a fact.

The day to day work of national security, things like military to military training and engagement, things like logistic support and things like sending emails is often done by career folks who have. longer term relationships for better or for worse, right? You've got a institutional trauma, drama, knowledge, all of the above.

I think we don't know because we don't know. And anyone who tells you otherwise is I want whatever they're having.

Chanan Tigay: And one of the things we don't know, I think. is given this new Department of Government Efficiency. Yes. How many of those 50 brilliant women are still going to have jobs?

Maggie Feldman-Piltch: God willing, all of them, if I have anything to do with it.

Chanan Tigay: All right. Nadav.

Maggie Feldman-Piltch: Yeah.

Nadav Eyal: Beyond uncertainty, one of the things that's happening across the region is that the region reads these nominations, although, as you rightly stated, still not confirmed as a support for Israel, or specifically as a support for the Netanyahu government. This is how the region is reading it.

This is how the Saudis are reading it, and the Palestinians too. That doesn't mean that this is how this is going to be played out, right? But this is how it's being read across the region. And that's very important. That's very important. Because what it tells the Saudis and the Palestinians, what it tells Hamas.

And we know that Israel will be trying to reignite negotiations for the hostages release. In the next few weeks, there was a meeting this evening in the Prime Minister's office with the heads of Israel's security services about that. We know that this messaging of, this administration seems to be housed by people who have been extremely supportive of Israel's war.

It is very important for the Israelis to give the impression that they have the backing. Of the world's only superpower and therefore maybe lead to concessions from the other side and as far as Israel is concerned To an end for the war. So again, I'm not saying that this is how it's going to be played out I really don't know but I do know that with the Abraham Accords This was one thing that nobody foresaw and I remember myself sitting in DC in an off the record Chatham house Meeting with people in December, 2020 sorry, December 2016 just after Trump was elected.

And I remember the way that people in the room reacted to Jared Kushner saying, we're gonna try and have new peace agreements in the region. Nobody bought into that. Nobody believed that. And people in the room were like, we're the experts. We are the professionals. And you're a real estate guy and this was actually said and I didn't know anything about Jared Kushner or the rest.

It wasn't part of my kind of internal debate. I was there as an Israeli journalist And I didn't get even to ask questions But I was looking at that and I didn't know what to believe and they did get the Abraham Accords and one of the reasons that the Abraham Accords And again, that doesn't mean that this can happen again with Saudi Arabia or with any others is because for the UAE and for Bahrain, it was very clear that the way to D. C. passes through some sort of normalization with Israel. And it worked. Now, this is not a general defense of the first Trump administration. It's definitely not a, a defense as to the next Trump administration, but this is how the Middle East tends to read these things. And one of the things that often happens in the West, I'm not sure, as sure as to the U. S., but generally in the West, is downplaying the importance of perceptions of power and giving much more importance to narratives and to ideas of international law. Perceptions of power are really important and sometimes the, the way that wars end is with a clear winner. And actually it's more times than the other, that this is how you finish conflicts.

And this is the hope of the Israeli government that's going to happen. These days now, I don't know if this administration is going to be as focused I for one think and I think this message should be delivered to the administration and to the president elect The if the president puts his president elect puts his energy to it He can lead to a breakthrough with the hostages.

I Think that this is a really important message to the President Trump, and I know that the hostage families, it's very important for them to make that message. And the reason I think that is because he is in a unique position to pressure Qatar, pressure, in that way, Hamas, and also pressure, if needs be, the Israeli government, in order to get a deal and get the hostages back.

And as an Israeli, I don't think that there's anything more important. than that

that

Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib: I just wanted to really briefly comment on, the fact that something like seven of the hostages are American citizens, I think there's evidence to suggest that Mr. Trump is going to push very hard using that particular angle of that that the United States is not going to leave.

American hostages in Hamas's captivity. We saw, it was a very interesting dynamic what played out with, right after the election of Mr. Trump. The Qataris, There were like these, almost like state controlled rumors that the Qataris asked Hamas to leave. But then Qatar came out and Hamas said, actually, not really, we didn't really do it.

But then the Qataris were like we're gonna pull out of the negotiations. And I think what it was is like a clear signal of the Qataris. Being really concerned about Trump 2.0 presidency. We saw the reshuffling of major defense and intelligence and security posts within the state of Qatar, indicating that there is internal turmoil and concern about the consequences of a Trump presidency.

There's also the fact that even though the United States. Part of why Hamas was the Qataris were telling Hamas in June of 2023. We're going to cut off funding for you. The suitcases full of cash that once again, Mr Netanyahu approved was because they wanted the renewal of the lease on the allotted air base and with the largest Air Force base in the Middle East and the headquarters of Central Command.

We know that Mr Trump may decide despite the renewal of that lease to somehow pull out. of that base and, which is an anchor of Qatari national security to protect them both against Iran and against their other Gulf players. But just one last thing with regards to Mr Trump's victory.

It's actually ironic that there's an alignment between the current Israeli government and many of the Arab governments by Trump's victory. There's this perception. Of Mr Biden and by extension, Kamala Harris as being weak as being disengaged. And before October seven like the there's that infamous clip of Jake Sullivan saying that the Middle East hasn't been this calm and so long and the state like they scrambled to get that video really deleted from the Web did not age well.

Nadav Eyal: Yeah, exactly. By the way, this is Exactly or almost exactly the same quote by the british during the time of the british empire just before things started happening and then erit Israel palestine. It was Considered the quietest place for the british empire ever So this is the kind of quote that you should always remember as a foreign security official Just don't say that about any place, don't do that.

Maggie Feldman-Piltch: I want to jump in so I have not been involved in the hostage negotiations that are currently ongoing. I have been involved in three hostage negotiations in other places in the world, and it causes me an enormous amount of pain to say what I'm about to say, but my job is to make this make sense and to tell the truth as I know it.

And I really want to say that what I'm about to say causes me immense sorrow. We are working under the assumption, I think, when we make comments like this, that the next administration may have more luck bringing in, bringing home hostages. And God willing, that is true. I don't want it to be that long.

I'd love for it to be today. But that comment comes from an assumption, perhaps, that we know where everyone is, and that there is someone alive on this planet who knows where everyone is. There are public reports that they, that may no longer be the case. Something that is important to have into, in your mind, in consideration, is that When we say hostage negotiation, it doesn't necessarily mean that you have one side on one side of the table, another side on another side of the table, and one side is saying, bring them home.

The other says, no, I don't want to. This is much messier than that. I wish that it wasn't. I can tell you from my own professional experience, those situations were relatively easy. One involved Cuba and one involved North Korea. So what does that tell you? Everyone knew where everyone was at the time. We don't know that's the case here.

And, I've never had the opportunity to speak to this many Jews at once. What a time. And I would be remiss if I didn't pass That information on and perhaps this is something people know, but maybe it isn't. And as my friend, Laura Adkins, often tells me, the things that you think other people know, they definitely don't know.

So tragically, that is something we need to keep in mind.

Chanan Tigay: Yeah, that's a sobering thought. Thanks for it. Maggie, going back to you. Touching on something you began to talk about. I think when you're answering the first question How much is what's going on a conflict between Israel and Hamas or Israel and Hezbollah?

Versus those two essentially being symptomatic of a larger conflict between Israel and Iran and other Regional actors.

Maggie Feldman-Piltch: The clock says we have 38 minutes and 29 seconds. I don't think yes. And to quote another brilliant woman in national security, Nicole Zion. Yes. And I would say regional actors, everybody you just named and lots of people and countries you didn't mention.

We live in an interconnected world, right? My little brothers who are four and eight are watching this live stream right now. They're not over here. Yeah. Where you are is not reflective of where you stand, right? So I would say the war with Hezbollah, for example, is not a two sided one, and I'm not about to make, a comment about Iran.

I am, but I'm not. What I mean is that The Lebanese army has a formal training and collaboration agreement, a state partnership program, in fact, I think, as well with the U. S. And that's a good thing, right? We, the civilian control of the military is not a naturally occurring thing. It's something you have to cultivate.

You've got to train and build. And Lebanon and Hezbollah are not the same thing. Just like Hamas and Palestinians are not the same thing. So what's happening with Hezbollah is also a kind of, in some ways, a U. S. Lebanon thing. But I know that's not really what you're asking me. What you're asking me is about China, Russia, Iran, North Korea.

And if you're me and you're into good branding, you would call that crink. C. R. I. N. K. And I want to be clear about two things. One these are a group of nation states that have some things in commons and some things not in common. They do things together. They do things not together. And that is 80 percent of the answer by which I mean to group them together, you do lose some nuance.

But for the purposes of our conversation, it matters. So how many of us are aware that there are approximately between 000 North Korean soldiers in, okay, yeah yes, right? If you don't know what they're doing on the internet, come find me later, we can talk about it, it's fascinating. The reason I mention this is because to those of us living relatively, hopefully, normal lives, We are aware of the fact that North Korea and Russia share a border, but do you know how many time zones there are between the border Russia and Ukraine share versus North Korea and Russia?

Hint, it's 11. Contiguous, which is wild. So why am I saying all of this in a question about what's happening in Israel and in the Middle East and what the heck does that have to do with any of us? There's a saying in the Department of Defense that the U. S. Army is always ready for land warfare in Europe, and they're damn good at it.

It's true, they are. It also means that we tend to be looking at things we've seen before and anticipate seeing them again immediately, and that is what conflict means. There have been a number of points over the course of today so far about information operations, information warfare, tick tock, again, you want to talk about that more, come find me later before my dear friend calls me esoteric, which is a deep compliment.

What I'm saying is that these are actors who are united by not only ideology and ideology sometimes, but Quite frankly, there are also a number of men who have a very clear idea about power. And I don't say that as someone who doesn't like men, I very much do, and I also like power. I just have a definition of what both of those things mean, and these nations share that definition.

And what is a way to drive division and cause chaos and get people more emotionally involved than you ever could imagine in the United States when we didn't do a damn thing for Otter Warmbier, a nice Jewish boy. This is a really good one.

Chanan Tigay: Yeah Now that before October 7th Iran was successfully achieving many of its strategic goals It had surrounded Israel with the so called Ring of Fire It was making inroads in Latin America and Africa and then October 7th came and that was a serious blow to Israel good for Iran And then after a while Israel launched the war in the north and very quickly decimated the highest levels of leadership in Hezbollah in Lebanon and its insurance policy against a large scale Israeli attack.

And given what you told us in your answer to the first question just now, what do you think we can expect from Iran in the near future?

Nadav Eyal: So first of all, it was Hezbollah who launched the war, right? It was Israel that responded to that war. Now, I didn't mean this as a got you kind of thing, but it's important because one of the things that happens in the U.

S., and I was tweeting about this during the war, is that nobody knew that it wasn't Hezbollah. Part of the community here engaged or maybe in some circles of decision making That there's a war in the north in Israel and that on October 7 It's true that Hamas initiated a war against Israel with this attempted ethnic cleansing But on October 8 Hezbollah decided to go to war against Israel and that decision was not An easy one.

It was not a natural one. It shouldn't be seen as obvious attacking Israel, but it was seen as obvious because the truth of the matter is that Israel did not have enough deterrence in the Middle East to prevent these fronts opening against it if it did have deterrence, which is a very contentious issue.

In international affairs and in security, it's very difficult to analyze, and it's always analyzed retroactively. But if Israel was only attacked by Hamas by Sinoir, in this kind of suicide and murder, or murder and suicide, mass killing attack, that is one thing. But for every foe of Israel to join the war And to attack Israel, including Iran directly for the first time in history.

And for what? What was the response? Why did Iran join this war directly? The answer is a targeted strike against a building that wasn't part of the Iranian embassy, but was very close to the Iranian embassy, in which a general An Iranian general was sitting and planning the Hezbollah attacks against Israel that were going on for months before that.

So because of this targeted strike in Damascus, not in Tehran, Iran decided to launch the widest projectile from the air attack in history, using drones and missiles and ballistic missiles against Israel. And then, after Israel killed Hassan Nasrallah and the entire Central Command, the chief of staff of Hezbollah and others, in Beirut, against the Iran, decided to, to attack.

So the first thing we need to say about that is that the Iranians miscalculated. They miscalculated because they had a strategy of what they labeled as strategic patience. And I don't know if that's the truth, because I don't know enough Persian. But at least in Arabic, there are few words to describe patience in Israeli.

You know, you almost don't have one. I'm saying in Israeli, not in Hebrew because I don't wanna I don't know. I indict everyone in the room. Okay, but in Israeli language, we, we almost don't have any word for patients. But the strategic patients thinking off Iran. Was that it will have this circle of proxies around Israel that will be used as leveraged and will deteriorate the general condition within the Israeli sphere.

To the point that Iran could maybe break out to a bomb or have the capacity of nuclear weapons without Israel being able to respond because it will be deterred because of those dozens of thousands of missiles and rockets that will be shot by Hezbollah, GPS guided, will make life hell in Israel, and then they'll also employ Hamas and Hezbollah will invade the Galilee and all of these narratives and scenarios which were actually real.

That the idea has been preparing for many years. It was just that it was preparing for the north and for Iran. It wasn't preparing for a full scale invasion by Hamas, the sense that we go. Now, the Iranians are starting to understand what the Israeli defense apparatus knew for a long time, and they were briefing us.

And I wrote this before the Israeli success. Guys. Against Hezbollah, and I said that if you listen to me call me back with Dan Senior, Which I guess some of you do – that's a shout out to all of those who don't listen to the podcast

Maggie Feldman-Piltch: Is that a podcast?

Nadav Eyal: Yeah, it is. So that Israel did not prepare for the Hamas attack But it was preparing for years to fight Iran and was preparing for years to win decisively against Hezbollah and This is something that the Iranians didn't get.

They also didn't get that after the first Israeli response that was very, to the Iranians, that was very restrained, mainly because of US administration pressure and because the Israelis wanted to make sure that the Iranian regime knows The Islamic Republic regime knows, I should say, that Israel has struck one air defense in a specific place without them even understanding how this happened.

It was a very direct and targeted attack. And then the Supreme Leader made another mistake. And then he got his entire air defenses, 70 percent of his air defenses, taken out of the field. And now the Iranians are starting to understand, also we hit at the same time, it's a scoop by a colleague of mine, Barak Ravid, that Israel hit in Parachin a very specific component of what we call the arms group that is supposed to handle the possibility of a nuclear weapon, of actually assembling a nuclear weapon.

And this is something that was just published so israel knew exactly what to hit And the fact that they are so vulnerable to israeli intelligence and israeli capabilities is something that they never imagined and Nasrallah didn't ever imagine that too and part of what's happening in the region is that israel is restoring Its deterrent In the region and without that I'm, not saying this is an advocacy kind of thing, but you can clap but without this there's no chance Of maintaining peace in the region and this is something that david ben gurion Who initiated the security doctrine of israel?

really maintained throughout his career and he understood this back in the thirties. Zionism was very much, this is a Zionism conference, Zionism was very much focused on international legitimacy. And what Ben Gurion's pivot was to actually make it not a Heim Weizmann political affair, but build a defense force that will defend Jews and will maintain the new state.

And this decision is the reason that he felt secure enough to actually declare the independence of Israel. And this is something that I think that the Iranians are starting to understand. Is not gonna go away. And we're seeing we see all this meeting somewhat peculiar between Elon Musk and the Iranian ambassador, but we're seeing that the Iranians did not respond, although the Supreme Leader promised a response.

I'm not saying it's not gonna happen, but they did not respond to the latest Israeli attack. And let's see how this plays out. I if I would need to advise them, which, of course, I'm not advising them. But I would say that if if they plotted to kill the president elect, maybe it's not such a good idea for them to escalate right now.

Chanan Tigay: Yeah,

Nadav Eyal: That's really good advice.

Chanan Tigay: Thank you. Thanks. Always good advice.

Nadav Eyal: Yeah, Ahmed.

Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib: A lot of what you said, I think, strategically, operationally, there's linear logic to it. I very much so hear and register that and I studied a lot of those things at the academic level at least. But if you plot Israel's deterrence, if you will and put it on a graph, you really will see that it goes up and down and up and down.

And my concern is that. You're saying that there is potentially a trajectory where Israel is restoring it's deterrence. But we know that's not permanent. We know that conditions change. We know that just like it changed in 73, just like it changed in, in, on October 7th, just like it changed in 2006 when Hamas, part of why I'm in the United States.

It's because of Hamas's abduction of Gilad Shalit. I was trying to cross back into Gaza when I was 16 years old and I couldn't go back in and then was followed up by the 33 day war in Lebanon. There's something else that could very well restore Israel's, and not only the longevity of peace in a, in, in, in conjunction with deterrence, but could fundamentally change the trajectory that we're on.

We're all on. And that is peace and that is given the working with. The Palestinians to end the conflict. I think October 7th has shown that we cannot perpetually manage the conflict and my Lord, I know that there's issues on the Palestinian side. I know that there's radicalization and I know that there's fragmentation, but there's also been radicalization on the Israeli side.

There's been an unwillingness to acknowledge that we are going to need to solve this conflict. That annexation does not work. that the power of the sword alone will not work. And I'm concerned that instead of, while it was painful, and I've been talking to Israeli victims of October 7, I've been putting myself out there to my own detriment and risk, working with hostage families and trying to push for a deal, and humanizing the victims of October 7, and speaking out against anti Semitism, and speaking out against the hatred.

And saying, not in my name, my people are beautiful. We, I do not want us to be associated with the Islamic Republic's led axis of resistance and the slave owning Houthis and the disgusting Hezbollah and Hamas and the Islamization. That's all valid and true and I feel it. But it doesn't erase the need to solve the conflict instead of manage it.

It doesn't need permanent security. We've seen it with the United States. We've seen it with all sorts of great powers. You cannot manage conflict perpetually. And I'm gravely concerned along with many of my Jewish and Israeli allies and brothers and sisters who want a secure and a safe Israel, who want the end.

of Iranian sponsored terror that there's not a desire to strategically pivot away from security only as the pathway forward. And that concerns me.

Chanan Tigay: Let me, so let me dig into that just

Nadav Eyal: a little bit. I just want to say that I totally agree with that. I have absolutely no remarks to what you just said. I just want to say that in that sense, what I remarked about Ben Gurion and the founders of the state is that Israel's, main idea was not to have the power of the sword in order to retain it forever.

It, the idea was that this would lead the region to recognizing Israel's right to exist and presence in the region in order to actually get peace agreements that are always difficult and hard. And because of that what you just said is, tremendously accurate for me.

Maggie Feldman-Piltch: Can I footstop one thing?

Please.

Nadav Eyal: Thank

Maggie Feldman-Piltch: you. Because you've also, I, yes, you've also talked about power. We've had this conversation before and I, because what I get to bring to this table is the national security thing I'd to also add in support of what you said that anyone who tells you security is blowing things up or the ability to do so has missed the definition completely, right?

And it's the opposite of power. If what you are relying on is this current definition of security, talk to my Afghan friends, how secure they feel in these days. Not really at all power is what we're really after by which I mean the ability. To live where we want to live, make our own decisions, and be safe.

Which is not the same thing as secure. It is not the same thing as free. Everyone on this earth, it is my opinion, has that right. And anyone who tries to sell you a bag that's security, national or international, means this level of chaos should, I don't know, go on Wikipedia, man. That's not it.

Chanan Tigay: Ahmed, just to dig in a little bit to what you were saying, I was recently in Israel and I found, a nation traumatized and there's an appetite among some perhaps for a ceasefire, but for any return to the negotiating table with the Palestinians, I didn't hear a person say it.

You have family in Gaza, you have sources in Gaza. I'm wondering from that side of the equation, is there an appetite to return to the peacemaking table with Israel at this point?

Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib: And I certainly understand why after the worst single day tragedy for the Jewish people since the Holocaust. There would be little appetite for a discussion of a Palestinian state.

There's this, if I have a penny for every time I heard the idea that this would somehow amount to rewarding. Hamas for its terrorism. I have a lot of money right now. And the reality is that this would be the opposite of what Hamas is after. Hamas is after perpetual chaos. Hamas is after a never ending conflict.

Hamas is after delegitimizing Israel by forcing the Israelis to conduct It is a military operation that has killed 44, 000 people. And you can dispute the numbers and how many combatants, whatever, but tens of thousands of people, including my own family members, children as young as three and four months old, shredded to bits and pieces.

None of them had anything to do with Hamas, yet my family, like tens of thousands of people in Gaza, have paid the ultimate price. For a sin that they did not commit, and a sin that they did not have a say, a war that they didn't start, and a war that they are powerless to stop. This idea that Palestinians are perpetually interested in conflict are perpetually against the prospect of peace is not only inaccurate, but it, I talk to people in Gaza.

I talk to my family. I know this I talk to Israeli politicians who are like all of Gaza is Hamas, and I'm like, are you kidding me? Half of Gaza are affiliated with Fatah and the Palestinian Authority, who are ideologically, not just politically, ideologically opposed to Hamas, who signed on to the two state solution, who renounced violence, who said that we accept the concept of the two state solution.

And I'm willing to be the first to tell you, by the way, The mistake of Yasser Arafat in the 2000 Camp David and not going for that. And that's, we can have a whole panel for why he walked away from that under threat of Hamas. We can talk about why Abu Mazen, whom I know I've talked to Abu Mazen in the past, didn't go for the Omer plan in 2008.

And it wasn't a rejection of the idea of two states, but it was very tactical and specific. And I have said repeatedly, that was a mistake. I've said, why didn't, why wasn't a Palestinian state established? Even if it was provisional, with the idea that Israel at the time in the 40s or 50s was, temporary or transitional.

Okay, playing along, why wasn't a Palestinian state established between 1948 and 1967? There was Gaza, there was the West Bank, there was East Jerusalem. And instead, Jordan effectively annexed the West Bank, the Egyptians took over Gaza, Palestinian nationalists who tried to establish a Palestinian government, who tried to build a state, were arrested and prevented from exercising.

So this is what I tell my Palestinian companions and brothers and sisters and Arabs, that there's more to why we don't have a state 76 years later than simply the Zionist project or the Israeli policies or a rejection of Palestinian statehood. That said, unfortunately, we are in a place right now where the diet that many in Israel have been fed and you can disagree with me, that's fine, you don't have to accept my premise is that the Palestinians are perpetually uninterested in having a state that doesn't include the entirety of the land, from the river to the sea, which, by the way, we know was a Likud slogan that began and it was repurposed and I hate that slogan and I've turned it with some of my friends saying from the river to the sea, only peace will set us free.

Okay, from the river to the sea, you're going to see two peoples, Israeli, millions of Israelis and Palestinians are here to stay. No, I went esoteric with that one. I support it. But going just back to the specifics, there absolutely is an appetite and this is part of why I started putting myself out since October 7.

And I'm speaking very specifically about Gaza. Gotta keep in mind, Gaza and the West Bank are not only geographically separated, but they're politically different, they're culturally different. They even the, there's slight dialect changes in the Arabic that folks speak.

People in Gaza are this is why I'm confident this is going to be Gaza's last war. They're turning against Hamas en masse. They do not want to be pawns. They do not want to be pawns to an armed resistance futile project. They do not want to be pawns in a pan Islamist axis of resistance.

We've been pawns to the pan Arabism of Nasser in the 50s and 60s. And then we tried the PLO's secularism and the PFLP's Marxism and leftism, and we've tried now Hamas Islamism. Different ideologies, same outcomes, which is more loss of land, more death, and more destruction. And the Palestinian people are not stupid.

We see that. We understand it. I'm not speaking on behalf of the Palestinians, by the way. I speak for myself, but there are many Palestinians who share my frustration with our leadership. That said We also feel that we're not acknowledged, our mere existence is not acknowledged by many in Israel who normalize the idea that we're just gonna absorb the Palestinians and the Palestinian state is just going to exist in Gaza and Judea and Samaria are a fact on the ground, it's irreversible, and that's a problem.

We talk about radicalization and de radicalization and the need to change the education system. I'm not gonna get into that much, but I can tell you that For all the de radicalization programs you're going to do. I was talking to a friend of mine who's in the West Bank, who's a multi millionaire dude.

He runs a tech entrepreneurial thing, and he's part of 700 Jewish Palestinian dialogue groups, and he's I will make peace with Israelis, the Tel Aviv Israelis and the Yaffo Israelis, overnight. But he said, it takes me one hour at the Qalandia checkpoint in between Jerusalem and Ramallah to be fully deradicalized and I'm a millionaire dude, and I have a VIP pass, and I imagine the masses in the West Bank.

Imagine the people in the Gaza Strip. So I'm saying we have a unique opportunity right now, whereby the people in Gaza Not only because of the consequences of October 7th, but because of the behavior of Hamas and how they're carrying out the war and how they've squandered the they've destroyed the fragile yet viable Oslo peace process in the 90s.

I was in Gaza and I've experienced the tail end of the Oslo process. Gaza had a short lived airport and I flew into Gaza in 99 and in 2000. Can you imagine just even having the word airport and Gaza in the same sentence? Hamas Weaponized the second intifada through all the suicide bombings that destroyed the peace movement in Israel that destroyed the left and their rise to political power was very much so like parallel to the rise of the right far right in Israel.

They it was a very symbiotic relationship. That doesn't mean Moral equivalencies. That doesn't mean a one to one comparison. I'm just saying like they fed off of each other. They squandered the 2005 withdrawal from Gaza to turn Gaza into the beating heart of a future Palestinian state. They've dragged our people and all of these endless wars.

And now this is like October 7 is the ice is the crowning achievement of their failures. So people in Gaza are finished with Hamas and they're ready for true peace. that gives them statehood and self determination.

Chanan Tigay: Inshallah. So let me move. We have about 10 minutes left and I want to move to the United States a little bit. Nadav, I'm curious, do campus protests have any impact on what happens in the Middle East?

Maggie Feldman-Piltch: Five

Nadav Eyal: seconds. Go. I think it emboldens. Is those in the Middle East like Hamas and others that think that the entire state of Israel is illegitimate you will hear that on those kinds of protests and you will hear, of course, more than a streak of antisemitism and racism there towards Israel and towards Jews in general, but I think that this has led to an extent, I don't think, we know that this has strengthened.

speaking, Hamas leadership, thinking that they are actually supported. by the elite. And this gave them the false hope because they misunderstood, I think, the American public, or they were not reading the polls, or they had some kind of a wishful thinking to think that these encampments are actually representative to an actual political power.

And I think that the last elections, and I saw the exit polls in these last elections, gave us proof that any way you cut it, if you look at, the Jewish vote with Democrats or with the way that voters have responded to this kind of extreme And giving legitimacy to violence and seeing the entire state of Israel as a colonialist project.

And all of this pseudo radical rhetoric, they have responded to this during this election. Oh, again, on both sides of the aisle, whether you look at the Jewish community in this country or whether you look At Middle America, this was definitely not a narrative that was accepted in these elections. And I think that these encampments have led to an extent they could be accused in leading this war to be extended and to Hamas getting not only Hamas, also Hezbollah and Iran getting the feeling that they have the support of the West, or at least the, were the West's elite.

And that was, I believe a big mistake. I want to say something that I hate to ruin the optimism as to the future, and I'm not doing that because I don't want to see the scenario that was presented here. But I want to say something just in terms of realist terms. I don't see, as someone who's covering Israeli politics for more than 20 years now, I don't see any camp in Israel these days.

allowing any sort of territorial concessions vis a vis the Palestinians in the near future. That's just how it is politically. Okay. I'm not saying that this is how it should be naturally I'm just saying this is an observation. It's not gonna happen anytime soon now, of course Maybe president Trump is gonna come into office and he's gonna say to both sides.

Look I have my Deal of the century. Maybe you remember that this is I would take it very seriously, by the way 83 percent I want both sides to accept it He'll come to the Palestinians and to the Israelis that's that was a serious plan, by the way this administration didn't present a plan for Palestinian statehood and Palestinians didn't present a plan too.

I would say, you know If Palestinians are serious and the PA is serious and the Fatah is so different ideologically The best thing they can do with that is to present their own plan and not wait and I know that you'll be in the same Side of the eye, when I'm saying this, the best tactic would be to present a peace plan and to explain to the other side what is Suggested that the other side can actually accept in order to apply some pressure but right now politically speaking within Israel what Israelis have seen is the jubilate scenes in Gaza which were widespread as to the attack on Israel in the streets They're seeing that it was widely supported in the West Bank.

They're seeing that right now, the polls that we do have by Shkaki, Dr. Shkaki, who is, the best pollster or the only reliable pollster there, is that there is a widespread support to Hamas. And they're saying, why on earth should we concede more land for this to become another base for terrorists like we have seen with South Lebanon and like we have seen with Gaza, with the disengagement from Gaza?

Now, again, I don't think that this sentiment or this, these ideas necessarily the way to go strategically, I don't know, but this is, realistically speaking, what's happening. In israel and if someone wants to have a real peace process in the region It needs to be serious and it's it needs to be thorough and It's not going to be something that's going to happen You know tomorrow morning with just a plan because you need to restore trust And trust is what we are missing And this is not going to be restored for a long time We have here a society that I can speak with certainty about my own society, about the Israelis.

That's by no way downplaying the trauma with Palestinians, but Israeli society is traumatized. It feels like it embarked 30 years ago with a mission to get some sort of agreements in the region, it didn't abolish the Oslo Accords with all the talk of Netanyahu and the rest that criticized it and it disengaged from Gaza just in 2005 and it got this as far as Israelis are concerned in return.

That's a very powerful argument I know that you have here in this conference both a and Bennett and others who could explain this argument, I think better than I can because this is the sort of argument that they're presenting to the Israeli public. And I think it's gonna be very difficult to overcome.

Needs a lot of work to be done. And again, it needs to be very thorough and whatever administration is gonna do that, they need to understand that this is a mission, this is a lifetime mission.

Chanan Tigay: We have five minutes left, so I want to ask you each, the same question to close. This is a highly engaged and activated community.

And I'm curious if each of you could just spend a minute telling us what the folks in this room at this conference can do from here to influence the discourse and realities on the ground. What should they do now that is different than what we were all doing before October 7th? Ahmed, can we start with you?

Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib: I'll start by saying these polls that everybody posts, Shikaki, the IDF itself found evidence that was how widely published that Hamas manipulated the results. In Gaza. In Gaza, exactly. And there's the James Zogby did with the Tony Blair Institute, a survey a couple of months ago, and in a couple of days they're going to reveal.

I talked to people who are doing the survey, and it shows overwhelmingly, like not just a simple majority, Overwhelmingly, the people of Gaza reject Hamas, hold it responsible, don't want Hamas to be in control. So that doesn't mean they're going to be Zionist tomorrow, okay? It just means that you, the public opinion on the Palestinian side or on the Israeli side or on any society side is not static.

It's very elastic. It moves, it shifts, it changes. What I would say is We need to challenge this notion that the Palestinian people are monolithic, that they all think the same, they all support Hamas, they all and, by the way, someone who supports Hamas, and this is the nuance that is lost, you can support Hamas, but it could very much so be a vote against the Palestinian Authority, which I agree is lethargic, and corrupt, and pathetic, and has squandered numerous opportunities.

They love to go to Tel Aviv using their BCM. VIP things and get liquor and wine and then they go to the West Bank and then they say the Zionists this the Zionists that I have had enough of that garbage. That said, it is absolutely the case that there are willing partners on the Palestinian side and we need to stop the dehumanization of Palestinians.

We need to acknowledge that just there's radicalization in Palestinian society. There is radicalization in Israeli society that I actually think, and that's part of my ethos is I don't see the longevity of the Zionist project without a viable Palestinian state that can complete the cycle that can ensure Jewish self determination side by side with Palestinian self determination.

And it takes all of us whether it be in our community, in our synagogue, in our school, to believe that and to visualize and verbalize that and challenge entrenched narratives.

Chanan Tigay: Yep. Maggie.

Maggie Feldman-Piltch: Oh, I want the last word. He can go next.

Chanan Tigay: Okay.

Nadav Eyal: Ladies last. That's a smart move. Nadav. Okay. I'll be really short. I think that there are two main things. The first thing is to support as much as people can. Israel, it's in the most difficult position it has ever been since the War of Independence.

And if there is a time in history to support it since the War of Independence, Israel is a highly traumatized society, not because only of October 7th, but because of what happened since. October 7th never ended. The hostages are still there. Since the Holocaust, there is no group of Jews who have suffered as those hostages 101 souls that are held by Hamas and across the Israeli society with reserve soldiers, families with others, the level of trauma more than a year, people are fearing the knock on their door saying that their loved one has been killed in action, either in the north or in the south or by a drone.

So if there is a time to, to support the society, and of course I'm part of the society so it's my vested interest, the time is now. And the second thing is, and I know that many of you do, and I want to thank you for that, and I appreciate that. And this does not go unnoticed because Israelis feel that they are alone.

They saw these demonstrations, and they feel very much alone. And the other thing is, of course, to bring as much awareness. to the need to get the hostages back. Israel will never be the same. Even now, when we know that many of the hostages died in captivity or have been murdered, or died in action because of the war that is happening in Gaza.

But if these people will not be back, something very important in the Israeli psyche, in the Israeli narrative, would be simply lost. and will never be regained again. And this is why, myself as a journalist and others, we understand that it's not only up to Israel. It's not only up to American pressure.

And we do see that Hamas has been the stumbling block to a deal, at least in recent months. But what we're saying is that it is crucial to pressure all sides, so all sides will do everything they can And Israel can do, and the rest can do. So they will be able to face the Israeli society and these families and say, we have done everything, everything means everything, to get the hostages.

Chanan Tigay: Thank you. And the final word.

Maggie Feldman-Piltch: Thank you. So I say this as the American Jew among the three panelists Three things. One, the training that I've received academically and professionally, we divide things into think, feel, and know. And you gotta know when you're on which one of those. Don't confuse them.

If I could offer something for each of us in this room to do, American Jew in particular, but all of us, is For the love of all that is holy, please stop confusing weaponized ignorance with hate. They are not the same thing. Anti Semitism is alive and well and living on this planet, absolutely, but we are the people of the book and we have an opportunity.

We have a job. We need to learn ourselves and we need to teach others. So if you find yourself in a situation where someone is getting angry because Israel used a 2,000 pound bomb and you don't know how to explain why that was the right weapon to use in that moment. Call me. If you find yourself in a situation where someone says, I don't want Palestinians to have statehood because it doesn't feel fair, call me and I will tell them the following, which I know to be true.

Regardless of what I think or feel. It is, in fact, what I think and feel as well. We have two options on this planet. We can all be dead or we can all have two states. You don't have to like it, but from a national security professional who looks at this all the time, this is what's available to us. I'd like to live.

And I'd like Israel to be here, too.

Chanan Tigay: Amen. Let's give a round of applause to our wonderful panelists. Thank you, Ahmed. Thank you, Maggie. Thank you, Nadav. Thank you all for being here for this fabulous discussion. Enjoy the rest of Z 3.