Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel Initiative”
October 14, 2026
*Assessing the current negotiation with the Ayatollah regime, the US should draw lessons from the 48-year-negotiation cycles since 1978, which have benefitted the Ayatollah regime, catapulting it from a 2nd rate geo-strategic power to a 1st rate power. The negotiation option expedited the transformation of Iran from “The American Policeman of the Gulf” to a chief epicenter of anti-US terrorism, wars, drug trafficking and money laundering, from a Persian Gulf footprint to a rogue global footprint, extending throughout the Middle East, to Central Asia, East and North Africa, Latin America and on US soil.
*The Ayatollah regime has employed gaslighting tactics since late 1978 and early 1979. It wasinitially introduced by Ayatollah Khomeini – then in exile in Neauphle-le-Château, France – who assigned a team of eloquent Iranian graduates of Western universities to conduct a systematic campaign of diplomatic outreach and public posturing, targeting the US Embassies in Paris and Tehran, the State Department, the CIA and the White House, as well as the US media and academic establishment.
*The gaslighting campaign represented Ayatollah Khomeini as an anti-communist ally, a bulwark against Moscow, committed to non-interference in neighboring countries and the non-exportation of the Islamic Revolution. He was presented as a spiritual leader, preoccupied with religious teaching and the well-being and human rights of the Iranian people, including women, Christians, Bahais, Zoroastrians and Jews.
*Ayatollah Khomeini’s messages manipulated the US into abandoning its staunch ally, the Shah of Iran, and to brutally lean on Iran’s military to succumb to the Ayatollah regime. The gaslighting campaign exploited the US’ eagerness to achieve an agreement, to promote human rights, democracy and non-interventionism. In addition, Khomeini leveraged the US’ fervor to secure the orderly supply of Persian Gulf oil, and benefit from the immense potential of economic cooperation with Iran, while taking lightly the elements of history, fanatical religion and ideology, which have shaped the ideology and strategy of the Ayatollah regime, transcending diplomatic and financial considerations.
*The gaslighting campaign manipulated the US to reject the well-documented warnings, issued by Iran’s military, of Khomeini’s 1,400-year-old fanatical, apocalyptic Shiite non-negotiable ideology, which mandates the regional and global exportation of the Islamic Revolution, the toppling all pro-US Sunni regimes, and bringing the “infidel” West to submission, especially “The Great American Satan.”
*How effective was Ayatollah Khomeini’s gaslighting offensive? Ten days before the official toppling of the Shah of Iran, President Carter told a conference of world leaders on the Island of Guadeloupe that a Khomeini-led Iran “would not export revolution… but would be interested in buying tractors, not tanks….” And, on January 11, 1979, six days before the toppling of the Shah, the CIA assessed that Khomeini would sit back and let his moderate, Western educated followers run the government…. US Ambassador to Iran, William Sullivan, argued that “upon returning to Iran from exile in France, Ayatollah Khomeini will play a “Gandhi-like” role; elections would likely produce a pro-Western Islamic Republic…” Harold Saunders, Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern affairs, told the Senate Subcommittee on the Middle East that he did not sense anti-US sentiments as something that makes the relationship with the Ayatollah regime unworkable….”
*Prof. Elie Kedourie, a game-changing Middle East historian (London University), sounded the alarm on a chorus of academic and official voice, in Washington, DC, singing the praises of Khomeini….” He provided a few examples, which documented the success of the Ayatollah’s gaslighting campaign (Encounter Magazine, November 1984). For instance, ”on November 1, 1979, four days before the storming of the US Embassy [in Tehran], National Security Advisor, Brzezinski, told [the Ayatollah’s] Prime Minister and Foreign Minister that the US is prepared to expand security, economic, political and intelligence relationships [with Iran]….” Furthermore, Prof. Richard Falk (a global authority on international law, Princeton University) “assured his readers that the Islamic Republic will be flexible in interpreting the Koran…. The Islamic Republic will be a stabilizing element geopolitically….”
*In 2026, the Ayatollah regime has perfected the gaslighting tactic, along with Taqiyyah (dissimulation), displaying exceptional capabilities in its negotiation with the US Administration, and assisted – intentionally or unintentionally – by the National Iranian American Council (NIAC) and The isolationist and pro-Ayatollah regime Quincy Institute (funded largely by George Soros and the isolationist Koch family), and particularly by the Iranian-born Trita Parsi, whowas a co-founder and former President the NIAC and is a co-founder and Executive Vice President of The Quincy Institute.
*The NIAC and the Quincy Institute have consistently promoted the key strategic goals of the Ayatollah regime. The Ayatollah regime and the shadow allies in Washington have attempted to convince the policy-making, media and academic establishment into playing-down the Ayatollah’s fanatical, apocalyptic ideology, and sustain the negotiation option, which has bolstered the geo-strategic rogue posture of the Ayatollah regime. These two entities have contributed to the perpetuation of the Ayatollah regime; thus, intensifying the capabilities of the chief anti-US epicenter of regional and global wars, terrorism and drug trafficking. This has magnified regional instability, has threatened the existence of all pro-US Arab regimes, and has ruthlessly oppressed the Iranian population, especially women and ethnic and religious minorities. Their opposition to maximum pressure economic sanctions, the military offensive on the Ayatollah regime and foreign-imposed regime change has yielded a tailwind to the venomous octopus in Tehran with its tentacles stretching from the Persian Gulf to Latin America and US soil.
Is the US determined to repeat or avoid the critical mistakes of the last 48 years?
Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel Initiative”
October 9, 2026
*On April 10, 2006, Muammar Gaddafi gave a speech in Timbuktu, Mali:”The fifty million Muslims of Europe will turn it into a Muslim continent within a few decades…. Allah will grant Islam victory in Europe without swords, without guns….”
*The Western and Islamic concepts of migration differ fundamentally, ideologically, religiously, legally, socially, economically, tactically and strategically. The Western concept is driven by secular, moral, legal, and socio-economic precepts, focusing on rights, borders, labor markets, and humanitarian protection under international law. In contrast, the Islamic concept of migration (hijra) is doctrinal, theological, ideological and strategic, deeply rooted in the 14-century-old legacy of the Prophet Muhammad and the Qur’an. In fact, the Hijra marks the first year of the Islamic calendar (Hijri).
*Prof. Kelly M. Greenhill, MIT and Tufts University Political Science, the author of Weapons of Mass Migration (Cornell University Press, 2016) has documented Gaddafi’s and Erdogan’s practice to intimidate West Europe by the threat of induced Islamic migration.
The Hijra Doctrine
*The Hijra doctrine refers to the Prophet Muhammad’s migration from Mecca to Abyssinia and Medina as a divinely-ordained act. It was perceived as a strategic migration to reorganize and expand Islamic dominion “in the cause of Allah,” followed by armed Jihad once a power base evolved in Medina.
*Hijra is explicitly treated in the Qur’an and hadith (an account of Muhammad’s actions and pronouncements) as a prototype of non-violent Jihad “for the sake of Allah,” where migration and fighting are coupled as complementary and commanded acts of devotion to Allah. Conceptually, Hijra has been a precursor and an ongoing key component of Jihad – a preliminary tactic toward the subjugation of enemies.
*Linguistically and theologically, the Qur’an lumps together faith, migration (hijra) and combat (qital/jihad) in several verses. For example, according to the Quran 8:74, “Those who believe, and adopt exile [migrate], and fight for the sake of Allah… they are the true believers.” Hijra is not merely a form of relocation; it is a spiritually, significant strategic (preferably non-violent) struggle undertaken for Allah.
Hijra Foundational precedents
*In 615AD, the Prophet Muhammed migrated to Abyssinia (Ethiopia) and in 622AD to Medina, establishing the Islamic precedent of hijra (migration), a divinely ordained move to advance the cause ofAllah – victory of the Abode of Islam over the Abode of the Infidel. Muhammed’s hijra aimed at avoiding obliteration by Mecca’s non-Muslim tribe of Quraysh, while establishing a strategic base, and upgrading capabilities. Consequently, Hijra enabled Muhammed to bring the Quraysh tribe to submission, dominating Mecca in 630 AD, and proceeding to sweeping military conquests and Islamization, regionally and globally. The Qur’an’s Surah 4:97-100 and Surah 8:72-75 are the key texts on Hijra, recognizing its foundational role in shaping Islamic strategy and tactics.
*In 670AD, Muslim warriors and their families/tribes migrated to amsar (garrison towns), such as Basra, Kufa, Fustat, and Qayrawan, designed to launch a large-scale Arabization/Islamization in conquered areas in the Arabian Peninsula and the Middle East at-large, Egypt and eventually the Maghreb (North Africa), and extending to southern Spain. In the 11th century, Turkmen tribes migrated to Anatolia, gradually shifting the region from Greek-Christian to Turkish-Muslim. In the 14th-16th centuries, the Ottoman/Islamic expansion employed military migration into the Balkan region, including Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece, south Croatia, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina.
*In 1804, Usman dan Fodio led a hijra in West Africa, before conducting the Sokoto jihad in the contemporary Nigeria and Cameroon.
*In the 20th and 21st centuries, the concept of Hijra was reinterpreted by radical Islamist theoreticians as a revolutionary terror methodology. For example, Sayyid Qutb, the leading Muslim Brotherhood radical/terrorist ideologue of the 1950s and 1960s, and Shukri Mustafa founder and leader of the radical Islamist group Takfir wal-Hijra in the 1960s and 1970s. Also,Al-Qaeda and ISIS used the concept of Hijra to attract foreign fighters to areas outside state control, such as the Afghan-Pakistani borderlands in the 1980s–1990s, and eastern Syria/western Iraq in 2014.
The Bottom Line
*While the Western interpretation of migration aims at integrating Muslim immigrants, the Islamic interpretation of hijra aims at dominating the Western “infidel.”
*Western interpretation of migration, on the one hand, and Islamic interpretation of migration, on the other hand, constitute contradiction in terms.
*Awareness to this conceptual difference is essential for Western democracies, in order to avoid dire consequences.
Palestinian State: Western Policy Making vs. Middle East Reality
Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel Initiative”
October 2, 2026
*The late King Hussein recognized Jordan’s susceptibility to a repeat of the deadly “Black September,” due to its intrinsic demographic vulnerabilities, such as the restive Palestinian majority time bomb, which traditionally collaborates with the subversive/terroristic Muslim Brotherhood, while the Bedouin tribal society is inherently fragmented. Therefore, the King warned Western and Israeli policy makers that a Palestinian state west of the Jordan River would doom the pro-Western Hashemite regime east of the river. Moreover, a Palestinian state would deny Jordan the defensive benefits of the Israel’s full control of the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria, that played a key role in aborting the “Black September” Palestinian assault. In fact, a more volcanic “Black September” could reoccur due to the presence of 1-2 million Syrian refugees in northern Jordan (some of them terrorists and drug traffickers), Iran-inspired terrorist activities in Jordan and the neighboring Iraq, and the potent presence in Jordan of Hamas terrorists, who are inspired by the October 2023 horrific terror offensive against Israel, and Western appeasement of Hamas, in particular, and Palestinian terrorism, in general.
*Western policy makers’ infatuation with the proposed Palestinian state has been driven by Western preoccupation with the moderate Palestinian talk, which is aimed at Western target audiences. On the other hand, Arabs have been preoccupied with the rogue Palestinian intra-Arab walk, which has led the Arabs to display indifference-to-rejection toward the proposed Palestinian state.
*Since 1948, Arab countries have never flexed military, financial or political muscles on behalf of the proposed Palestinian state. No Arab war against Israel was launched due to the Palestinian issue, and never did Arabs intervene militarily during Israel-Palestinian wars. In fact, in November 2023, an Iranian-Algerian-Palestinian proposition to end all diplomatic-economic-defense-tourist ties with Israel was rejected by a joint summit of The Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.
*While the Arab talk has been overwhelmingly supportive of the proposed Palestinian state, the Arab walk has systematically refrained from – and occasionally opposed – the establishment of a Palestinian state.
*Arabs do not sacrifice their interests on the altar of a proposed Palestinian state, which they consider as an existential threat. They are fully aware of the 55-year-rogue Palestinian intra-Arab track record, terrorizing their host Arab governments in Egypt (1950s), Syria (1960s), Jordan (1970), Lebanon (1970-1982) and Kuwait (1990). This track record has positioned Palestinians as the role-model of intra-Arab subversion, terrorism, treachery and ingratitude.
*The Arabs are, also, aware of the Palestinians’ collaboration with – and training of – terrorist organizations in Asia, Africa, Europe and Latin America, as well as their relationship with radically ruthless anti-Western regimes, such as Nazi Germany, the Soviet Bloc (including ideological and operational links with the Soviet KGB and the East German Stasi), Ayatollah Khomeini, North Korea, Cuba, Venezuela, China and Russia.
*Western policy makers have contended that Palestinian terror has been driven by despair, and therefore should be dealt with diplomatically and financially – not militarily – and bolstered by appeasement and concessions. However, Middle East reality documents that Palestinian terror has been driven by a fanatical ideology (e.g., Fatah’s and PLO’s 1959 and 1964 Charters – before the 1967 War), which mandates the total uprooting – not size reduction – of the “illegal Zionist entity.”
*Western policy makers have been obsessed with speculations about a reformed Palestinian state. In contrast, Arab policy makers have been preoccupied with the well-documented Palestinian rogue track record. They are convinced that assessments of the nature of the proposed Palestinian state – and its geo strategic impact – should be based on the well-documented track record rather than well-intentioned speculations.
*Therefore, Jordan and Egypt did their utmost to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state, when they fully controlled Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza in 1949-1967. Moreover, in 1948, the Arab League established the “All Palestine Government,” downgrading it to a “Palestinian Desk” in 1950-52, and eliminating it in 1955.
*In 1970, Jordan’s Prime Minister Wasfi al-Tal and Commander of the Armed Forces Habis al-Majali stated that Palestinian ideology was fundamentally incompatible with Jordan’s national sovereignty. In 1974, King Hussein warned Western policy makers that a Palestinian state in the West Bank would leverage Jordan’s demographic reality (e.g., a Palestinian majority) and constitute a real and clear existential threat to the Hashemite regime. In 1993, the King told the Head of Israel’s Mossad that the Oslo Accord could lead to a Palestinian state west of the Jordan River, an irredentist springboard, destabilizing Jordan – a death sentence to Jordan’s pro-Western Hashemite regime east of the Jordan River. That warning was echoed by Jordan’s military Chief-of-Staff and Head of Military Intelligence during the October 1994 signing of the Israel-Jordan peace treaty.
*The toppling of Jordan’s Hashemite regime would transform Jordan into another platform of anti-Western Islamic terrorism, involving the Muslim Brotherhood, Palestinian terror organizations, proxies of the Ayatollah regime, ISIS, etc. This terrorism would not be confined to the area of Jordan, but would spread southward, triggering existential threats to the pro-Western Arab regimes in Egypt (via the terror-ridden Sinai Peninsula), Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Kuwait, further destabilizing the Middle East – the epicenter of 9/11-like anti-Western Islamic terrorism, the location of 48% of global oil reserves and a critical intersection of trade sea lanes between the Far East and Western Europe.
*The toppling of the Hashemite regime would advance a key strategic aspiration of the Ayatollah regime to establish contiguous land access to Israel and to the Mediterranean (via Gaza), while encircling Saudi Arabia.
*A Palestinian statewould welcome cooperation with China and Russia, which would include intelligence stations and the funding of – and access to – an upgraded port in the Gaza Strip, bolstering their stature in the western Mediterranean, as Middle East powerbrokers at the expense of the US.
*Western policy makers, who accord much significance to moderate Palestinian talk, and therefore speculate on a reformed Palestinian state – which would abandon core ideology, depart from its rogue track record, and embrace peaceful coexistence – would benefit from the following country colloquialism: “You may put your boots in the oven, but that don’t make them biscuits!”
US-Israel Cooperation: High-Value, Low-Cost, Low-Footprint Team
Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel Initiative
September 23, 2026
*Israel’s distinction as the most high-value, low-cost, low (US) footprint, battle-tested, technologically-advanced and unconditional American ally – substantially more significant than the NATO countries, South Korea, Japan and Australia – is underscored by the F-35 combat aircraft program.
*Thus, Israel played a consequential role in the F-35’s evolution from a troubled, over-budget development program – doomed to fail according to top US avionic experts in 2018 – into the flagship fighter of the US Air Force. In fact, since Israel received the F-35, it has emerged as one of the world’s fastest-growing defense exports.
*Israel was the first country to operate the F-35 in combat (in 2018), and the only foreign user granted substantial authority to integrate indigenous software, electronic-warfare systems, weapons, and sustainment solutions. The US manufacturer, Lockheed-Martin, and the US Air Force are aware of the expected benefits derived from the invaluable operational, rapid-testing and validation, maintenance and repair feedback from Israel under a uniquely-intense battle-proven reality. Moreover, the Israeli real-world experience (in close cooperation with Lockheed Martin) – particularly in mission systems, data processing, electronic warfare, weapons integration, maintenance, and fleet availability – identified and resolved most of the technical and mechanical glitches, that might have otherwise required costly testing and redevelopment, and potentially aborting the entire F-35 program.
*Although the precise financial benefits have not been publicly quantified, the Israeli intense combat-proven experience and capabilities saved many years of research and development (equal to billions of dollars, as attested by the F-35 research and development cost – over $60bn). The Israeli knowhow reduced technical risks, accelerated the maturation of the aircraft, strengthened confidence among prospective buyers, and contributed to the F-35’s transformation from a widely criticized program into the centerpiece of US airpower and a multinational mega-billions of dollars export success.
*Hence, the F-35A ($92mn), the F-35C ($110.8mn) and the F-35B ($121.4mn) have been exported to more than 20 countries, including the United Kingdom, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, Belgium, Poland, Finland, Germany, Switzerland, Canada, Australia, Japan, South Korea, Israel, Singapore, Romania, Greece and the Czech Republic. Furthermore, export of the F-35 has experienced a massive surge, culminating in 191 aircraft delivered by Lockheed Martin in 2025, compared to 134 in 2019, making it one of the most widely exported 5th-generation stealth fighters in history. According to Lockheed-Martin, the F-35 backlog (mostly to the US Air Force) was $170bn in 2025.
*Israel has served as the F-35’s unique battle-tested laboratory, research and development center, as it has for the F-16, F-15, the Apache and Black Hawk helicopters, the THAAD and Patriot missile defenses and dozens of additional advanced US military systems). Israel has been a combat-proven showroom and battle tactics innovation center, bolstering the US economy – including expanded employment and increased corporate and individual income tax revenues – as well as enhancing the capabilities of the US Air Force, while extending the life-cycle and export-potency of advanced US military systems (e.g., the 55-year-old F-15 and F-16).
*Israel has contributed to the US defense and aerospace industries – which employ 2.5 million Americans – and to the US Armed Forces the same benefits it has contributed to over 250 commercial high tech giants (e.g., Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Apple, John Deere, Nvidia, Johnson & Johnson, General Electric, etc.), but much more! Israel has played a key role in boosting the global superiority of the US’ commercial and defense technologies.
*Israel provides an unusually densely-challenging innovation ecosystem, facing unique climatic, irrigation, agricultural, economic, health, medical and national security challenges. These challenges have yielded game-changing, ground-breaking developments and applications, which have been leveraged by many of the leading US commercial and defense industries.
*Therefore, in January 2026, the US and Israel announced a strategic framework covering AI, energy, advanced computing, space, semiconductors, and other critical technologies, explicitly linking the relationship to economic growth, job creation, and national security.
*Israel is the US’ most valuable operational partner for evaluating selected air-defense, missile-defense, counterterrorism, urban-warfare, intelligence, and force-protection capabilities under real-world conditions.
*Israel has been a significant node in the US’ determination to bolster its global superiority in the dual-use areas of small and medium-size space satellites, autonomous systems, unmanned aerial vehicles, medical technologies and combat medicine, cybersecurity and AI. Israel has advanced the US’ computing, semiconductors, aerospace and avionics, air and missile defenses, sensors and electro-optics, water and environmental technologies.
*Israel’s demography (facilitating the successful blending of Israeli agents in Muslim countries), geo-strategic location and rare existential challenges and experience, have transformed Israel into the most substantial intelligence partner of the US in the areas of counterterrorism, terror financing and money laundering, counterproliferation and regional/global threats. This partnership has also produced critical data on advanced military systems, manufactured by enemies and rivals of the US, which has uniquely benefitted the US economy and defense, saving American lives abroad and on US soil.
*According to the late Senator Daniel Inouye, who was the Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee and the Full Appropriations Committee, the flow of Israeli intelligence to the US exceeded the scope and quality of intelligence provided to the US by all NATO countries combined. Inouye assessed the value of the Israeli-delivered intelligence in billions of dollars.
*Israel provides the US with an unusually high level of annual R-o-I (return on investment) on the $3.8bn, which is exponentially higher than US “foreign aid.”
*Israel provides the US with a second-to-none combat-experienced, reliable forward operating base (irrespective of Left or Right governments, unlike other allies) in a most critical region. In addition to intelligence and defense-technology, Israel has generated tailwind to the US defense and commercial industrial bases. Thus, sustaining US manufacturing, engineering, subcontracting and export capacity – a mega billions of dollars contribution to the US economy.
*Israel constitutes a high-intensity force-multiplier and dollar-multiplier for the US. This Israeli feature has bolstered the US’ posture of deterrence with no US combat boots on the ground, unlike the NATO allies, Japan and South Korea. The latter rely on substantial US combat military bases and mega-billions of US dollars, which is required to maintain these bases, while refraining from flexing their muscles in the face of mutual existential threats.
newsletter
Subscribe for our daily news
videos
Israel – the US’ most productive ally
No Arab Demograpic Time Bomb in Israel
Ayatollah’s 47-Year-War Against the USA
popular posts
Newsletter
- Subscribe for our daily news
