Peace is not the answer. War is the answer.

President George W. Bush never asked for or followed my advice, but I sent him this letter on April 6, 2002:

Dear Mr. President:

I urge you to make a radical change to your policy regarding the conflict of Israel against the dictatorial and murderous regimes in the Middle East.

Peace is the wrong goal. Remember the words of Patrick Henry, when he disdained the goal of “peace” and declared, “Give me liberty, or give me death.” The correct goal is liberty—the preservation of liberty for Americans. And the liberty of Americans demands that we take the side of the defenders of liberty against its enemies.

There is only one government in the Middle East that defends liberty: Israel. Every individual, Jew and Arab alike, deserves freedom. But no Arab regime defends freedom for Arabs any more than it defends freedom for Jews. Arabs have a right to exist; the current Arab regimes do not.

We should not be seeking the amoral, impossible goal of peace between good and evil. We should be standing for the conquest by good over evil. America and Israel, for our own preservation, must conquer the Axis of Evil, which includes Arafat and his “Palestinian Authority.”

You should fire [Secretary of State Colin] Powell the appeaser, and kill Arafat the mass murderer of Israelis, Americans, and Arabs. America, with the support of Israel, should conquer the entire Arab Middle East, including Saudi Arabia, using our nuclear arsenal and our other military might. We must seize the oil properties that the Arab governments robbed; these stolen properties are the source of the wealth these regimes spend on terrorism. The entire region should be made a colony of the United States. You should encourage brave and adventurous Americans (and others) to settle and develop this colony, as those in the 1800’s settled and developed the American West.

This policy is the only way to defend the rights of Americans from the savages who will otherwise continue to use Western wealth and technology, which they robbed from us, to finance and engineer their terrorist acts.

This policy has the additional benefit of being the only way to bring freedom to all those now living in the region. But freedom for other peoples should not be America’s primary concern. Our primary concern should be freedom for Americans, which is why I urge you to adopt this policy.

Very respectfully yours,
Ronald Pisaturo

What has changed since my letter nine years ago? Israel has relinquished control of the Gaza Strip to the Palestinians; in return, the Palestinians launch rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel daily. Arafat is dead, but his political party, Fatah, is now the less ruthless of the two Jew-hating factions running the Palestinian territories. The other faction, Hamas, is a terrorist organization funded by Saudi Arabia, Iran, and other Islamist states. Israel has also withdrawn from South Lebanon; in return, Iran-backed Hezbollah has launched thousands of rocket attacks from that territory into Israel.

Then last weekend, U.S. President Obama said this:

Since questions have been raised, let me repeat what I actually said on Thursday—not what I was reported to have said.

I said that the United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine. The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states. The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves, and reach their potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state [which, by plane geometry, would entail a non-contiguous Israel].
…

And since my position has been misrepresented several times, let me reaffirm what “1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps” means.

By definition, it means that the parties themselves—Israelis and Palestinians—will negotiate a border that is different than the one that existed on June 4, 1967. That’s what mutually agreed-upon swaps means. It is a well-known formula to all who have worked on this issue for a generation. It allows the parties themselves to account for the changes that have taken place over the last 44 years. It allows the parties themselves to take account of those changes, including the new demographic realities on the ground, and the needs of both sides. The ultimate goal is two states for two people: Israel as a Jewish state and the homeland for the Jewish people and the State of Palestine as the homeland for the Palestinian people each state in joined self-determination, mutual recognition, and peace.

As Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has stated repeatedly, the 1967 lines—which leave a central part of Israel only eight miles wide—are indefensible and would mean the destruction of Israel. Obama seems to acknowledge this fact in his qualification of “mutually agreed-upon swaps.” But Obama’s qualification is absurd: it calls for the destruction of Israel as the starting point of ‘negotiations’. Imagine how much Israel would be forced to ‘negotiate’ away if the status quo is Israel’s destruction. Imagine how much a man would be forced to ‘negotiate’ away to a would-be murderer who hated the man and was already pointing a gun at the man’s head. This call for 1967 lines, along with the qualification about swaps, illustrates the absurd extreme to which Obama will push his evil premise, stated by Obama above: that the solution to the problem between Israelis and Palestinians should be based on “the needs of both sides.”

For Obama and a long line of American Presidents before him, right and wrong, good and evil, earned and unearned are irrelevant considerations; what counts is need. Since Palestinians need just as much land and wealth as Israelis do, and since Israelis currently have more of these things, it is Israel that must make concessions. Obama’s policy is the moral equivalent of Obamacare for Israel and the Palestinians.

Obama has stated repeatedly that he is dedicated to the security of Israel. But these statements are empty, because they are accompanied by acceptance of Israel’s enemies. These statements are like saying, “We support America, but we also support Al Qaeda”; or, “We support Jews, but we also support Hitler”; or, “If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor, but your doctor will now have to treat these additional patients in order to make a living.”

To his great credit, Prime Minister Netanyahu explained—in his speech Tuesday to a joint session of the U.S. Congress—that Israel is the only truly free nation in the Middle East:

This path of liberty is not paved by elections alone. It’s paved when governments permit protests in town squares, when limits are placed on the powers of rulers, when judges are beholden to laws and not men, and when human rights cannot be crushed by tribal loyalties or mob rule.

Israel has always embraced this path in a Middle East that has long rejected it. In a region where women are stoned, gays are hanged, Christians are persecuted, Israel stands out. …

We have a free press, independent courts, an open economy, rambunctious parliamentary debates. …

We’re proud in Israel that over 1 million Arab citizens of Israel have been enjoying these rights for decades.

Of the 300 million Arabs in the Middle East and North Africa, only Israel’s Arab citizens enjoy real democratic rights.

Now, I want you to stop for a second and think about that. Of those 300 million Arabs, less than one-half of 1 percent are truly free and they’re all citizens of Israel.

This startling fact reveals a basic truth: Israel is not what is wrong about the Middle East; Israel is what is right about the Middle East.

Unfortunately, Prime Minister Netanyahu stopped short of drawing an explicit ethical conclusion: that Israel is good and the Palestinian National Authority—and the whole society that this organization springs from—is evil. Of all the well-known commentators I have read and heard, only Glenn Beck (on May 24) drew the proper moral conclusion when he asked rhetorically, “Who’s on the side of good? Who’s on the side of evil?”

Nevertheless, Netanyahu was clear and correct in this passage about Iran:

But while we hope for the best and while we work for the best, we must also recognize that powerful forces oppose this future.

They oppose modernity. They oppose democracy. They oppose peace.

Foremost among these forces is Iran. The tyranny in Tehran brutalizes its own people. It supports attacks against American troops in Afghanistan and in Iraq. It subjugates Lebanon and Gaza. It sponsors terror worldwide.

When I last stood here, I spoke of the consequences of Iran developing nuclear weapons. Now time is running out, the hinge of history may soon turn, for the greatest danger of all could soon be upon us: a militant Islamic regime armed with nuclear weapons.

But here is the tragic part of Netanyahu’s position. Though he explained that Israel has always wanted peace while the Palestinians have always wanted the destruction of Israel, Netanyahu still called for a peace process and a Palestinian state side by side with Israel:

Two years ago, I publicly committed to a solution of two states for two peoples: a Palestinian state alongside a Jewish state.

I’m willing to make painful compromises to achieve this historic peace. As the leader of Israel it’s my responsibility to lead my people to peace.

Now, this is not easy for me. It’s not easy…

… because I recognize that in a genuine peace, we’ll be required to give up parts of the ancestral Jewish homeland. And you have to understand this: In Judea and Samaria, the Jewish people are not foreign occupiers.

We’re not the British in India. We’re not the Belgians in the Congo. This is the land of our forefathers, the land of Israel, to which Abraham brought the idea of one God, where David set out to confront Goliath, and where Isaiah saw a vision of eternal peace.

No distortion of history—and boy, am I reading a lot of distortions of history lately, old and new—no distortion of history could deny the 4,000-year-old bond between the Jewish people and the Jewish land.

But there is another truth: The Palestinians share this small land with us. We seek a peace…

… in which they’ll be neither Israel’s subjects nor its citizens. They should enjoy a national life of dignity as a free, viable and independent people living in their own state.

The tragic error of this position is that it bases Israel’s claims to land on the ancient history of the Jewish people. But on this premise, the Palestinians also have a claim to Israeli land.

Israel’s valid claim to Israel’s land is most emphatically not the ancient history of the Jewish people. By such reasoning, American Indians would have a claim to all of American land, savages throughout the world would have a claim to land everywhere, and everyone alive would have a claim to the Nile Delta.

Israel’s valid claim to its land is that Israel is essentially a free nation that offers freedom to those who live there. Period. And that is why the Palestinians have no legitimate claim to sovereignty over any land: the Palestinians, through their oppressive regimes that have murdered their own as well as their civilized neighbors in Israel, have proved themselves unfit to govern. Where their ancestors—or parents—were born is irrelevant. Where their religious relics are located is irrelevant: as individuals must not be discriminated against solely for religious beliefs, neither do they deserve special favors for such beliefs.

Contributing to this tragic error is Netanyahu’s use of the term ‘democracy’ when ‘liberty’ would be a far better term. ‘Democracy’ is a euphemism for mob rule. Moreover, Netanyahu’s praise for the idea of ‘democracy’ lends credence to the wrong notion that Palestinians have a right to elect their own government. But only individuals in a society with a basic understanding of individual rights have a right to vote.

If the Palestinians did have any valid claim of sovereignty—and they do not—it would be for the land occupied by the oppressive regimes surrounding Israel: Syria, Eqypt, Jordan, Saudia Arabia, Lebanon, and—most of all—Iran. But then, any moral society has a right to conquer these regimes, because these regimes have no right to exist.

With this understanding of principle, policy becomes clear. One of the few things that Obama was right about in his speech to AIPAC was, “The status quo is unsustainable.” That is true in spades. The United States and Israel should immediately declare war on Iran and wipe that nation off the map, seizing or destroying all of Iran’s energy assets and turning the valuable parts of that country into a colony of the U.S. That action alone would go a long way toward solving Israel’s problems, since so much of the terrorism in the Palestinian territories is supported and financed by Iran. After the destruction of Iran, over the course of a few days, the Saudis would probably be so frightened that they would surrender without a fight. If not, we should destroy them too. Ditto for Syria.

As for the Palestinians, we should oblige the aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas who called Netanyahu’s speech to Congress a ‘declaration of war’ against Palestinians. The U.S.—in return for some land or other payment—should help Israel retake the Gaza strip, all of the West Bank, and South Lebanon. We should have no qualms about bombing civilian neighborhoods from which rockets are being launched; Israel should not risk Israeli lives for the sake of the lives in an enemy territory. After conquering these territories, we should figure out how many surviving Palestinians we can afford to assimilate, do our reasonable best to sift out the civilized ones and allow adoption of children of the others, and forcibly march the others out of these territories, sending them crashing through the borders of Egypt and Jordan.

Oh, and the ‘peace process’ and a ‘two-state solution’ should be repudiated.

Of course, what I propose will not happen. But it is the way to save Israel—and America.