A Brief Guide for the Perplexed 29
20,000 in Hama and leveling the city as an unmistakable message to other fundamentalists in the country . And Assad ’ s son , of course , has taken state-instigated violence to an entirely new level .
They know how Iraq ’ s former President Saddam Hussein handled the valiant Kurds , using poison gas to kill hundreds of thousands and destroying countless Kurdish villages .
They know how Saudi Arabia reacted to Yemeni support for Saddam Hussein during the 1990-91 Gulf War . Overnight , the country expelled an estimated 600,000 Yemenis .
And they know how Egypt has dealt with its own Islamic radicals , thousands of whom have either been killed or locked up in jails without due process , both before and after the Muslim Brotherhood took power from 2012 to 2013 . Apropos , this has also translated into Egyptian cooperation with Israel in confronting Hamas in Gaza . After all , Hamas is an offshoot of the extremist Muslim Brotherhood .
The Palestinians count on the fact that Israel will not follow any of these examples . That is Israel ’ s strength as a democracy , but it comes with a price . The Palestinians seek to take advantage of it . But they have made one fundamental error — they have underestimated Israel ’ s will to survive .
Israelis desperately want peace . At the same time , peace at any price is no peace .
It took 31 years for Israel to achieve peace with Egypt , the Arab world ’ s largest and most influential country . It took another 15 years to sign a peace deal with Jordan , the country with which Israel has the longest border . And it took another 26 years to expand the circle of peace to include four more Arab countries — Bahrain , Morocco , Sudan , and the United Arab Emirates . No doubt , however much more time it takes , that circle will expand . And within it , it ’ s particularly noteworthy to see the speed and intensity with which relations have blossomed , particularly among