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“Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.” So, how is it that the Arab world manages to fool so much of the world over and over? 

In the 46-year history of Iran’s theocratic government, American political leaders in both parties stood by sanctions and condemnation of the country’s sponsorship of terrorism, repression of dissent, and nuclear ambitions, even when the door was open to negotiations. In the dozen days after Israeli warplanes struck Iranian military targets, with American stealth bombers delivering the much-sought coup de grâce with 30,000-pound bunker-busters on the Fordow nuclear enrichment site, the outcome remains uncertain domestically and abroad.

My plan was to be in Queens by the time this column appeared. The airport has been shut down, and all flights were canceled. I have spent the bulk of the last few nights in a secure room, awakened every few hours by air raid sirens. Within the past two weeks, my nephew has been wounded in Gaza, and a piece of shrapnel landed in front of the building where my cousin lives in a suburb of Haifa. Many shuls in my neighborhood are not having minyan because they don’t have bomb shelters.

By acting to avert an existential threat to the West and Israel that his predecessors had allowed to grow, the president has secured his place in American and Jewish history.

Donald Trump appears to have fooled both his friends and foes. And he has done something none of his predecessors dared to do. With a single stroke, his orders to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities may well have altered the path of history. The Islamist regime’s goal of building a nuclear weapon with which it could destroy Israel, intimidate America’s allies in the region into subservience and threaten the rest of the West with which it continues itself to be in a religious war is effectively finished.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the State of Israel made the courageous decision to cut off the head of the octopus that has been terrorizing them and the world for years. On Thursday night, Israeli jets breached Iranian airspace and took complete superiority over the skies above Tehran. Mossad agents on the ground took out high-level targets, and Iran’s nuclear program has been set back decades. Predictably, Iran retaliated, targeting civilian centers throughout Israel, killing many and wounding more, with numbers still being reported. Equally predictable was the reaction from all those who hate Israel, hate Jews, and want to destroy Western civilization. Those people should not only keep quiet—they should be openly professing gratitude to the Jewish state.

I went to sleep last night after hearing the news that Iran had fired missiles at the largest American airbase in the region, with no casualties or damage. I woke up this morning to the news that President Trump announced that Israel and Iran had agreed to a ceasefire. Predictably, both sides proclaimed victory. Iran claimed that the ceasefire had been imposed on Israel in the wake of its attack on the US airbase. Israel said that it was ending the war because its aims of ending the nuclear and ballistic missile threats from Iran had been achieved. What is the truth, and what can we anticipate in the days ahead?