Weekly Commentary: In our neighborhood you talk with your hands
Dr. Aaron Lerner 17 July 2025

I read the following line and rolled over laughing:

"...U.S. President Donald Trump is working to advance coordination
agreements between Israel and Syria and seeks normalization between them. An
Israeli war against Al-Sharaa's regime, even if aimed at protecting the
Druze minority in Syria, does not align with those ambitions."
Zvi Barel (Middle East affairs analyst) - No Plan - Haaretz front page
print edition 17 July 2025

This is the Middle East.

We talk with our hands.

Ahmed al-Sharaa didn't tell his troops to stop participating in the
slaughter of Druze because of a friendly telephone call from someone in the
Trump team.

He did it because we started to bomb key locations in Damascus - including
some broadcast live on Syrian TV.

He heard us when we talked with our hands.

We are also talking all the time in Lebanon.

I daresay that if our "conversation" with Hamas had not been handicapped by
a curious morality that makes the hostages more important than the lives of
many hundreds of soldiers and possibly thousands of civilian lives in the
future, that the Gaza challenge would already be behind us.

And that's really the point.

If we succumb to talking western style when we face a security challenge in
our neighborhood, we will fail.

Our relationship with former and possibly current and future terrorist Ahmed
al-Sharaa isn't hurt by our talking with our hands. Its enhanced.

I don't know if one day President Trump's dream that Syria joins the
Abraham Accords will come true. But if such an event is to be more than a
photo op for a presidential scrapbook, it is critical that the leader of
Syria is convinced that we are not Westerners who can be impressed by nice
clothing and remarks crafted by high priced PR firms.

Ehud Barak was right. Our neighborhood is a jungle. And in a jungle you
need, when needed, to talk with your hands.

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IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis

Since 1992 providing news and analysis on the Middle East with a focus on
Arab-Israeli relations

Website: www.imra.org.il