Notes on the Yom Kippur War

“Notes on the Yom Kippur War,” Wall Street Journal, October 18, 1973.

Excerpt:

One of the things that most exasperated me in Israel was the unwillingness to face up to Arab realities. Many of my Israeli friends could not confront the fact that the Arab nations do not accept, and will not in the foreseeable future accept, the existence of a non-Arab nation in “their” Middle East. The most they will concede is the survival of a limited Jewish community in a. bi-national Palestine which would be part of the Arab world. They may agree to cease fires, or truces, or armistices, and they may even temporarily recognize demilitarized zones if it is to their advantage to do so. But they will not sign any treaty giving de jure recognition to a Jewish state—no Arab leader has ever hinted at such a possibility—and it is utopian to think otherwise.