was a real kind of institutional reluctance there and they said, well, you know, we don't want to rule. we don't want to rule, janine. and i said, you ready? or i mean, like know, like you don't want to go into janine. you don't want to rule over janine. and my friend, you're on, you know, yossi, really? fouda. i mean you're you're showing up there in the middle of the night under the most high risk circumstances at times, and things are the most difficult to solve when terrorist acts are are just about to be committed and you're coming in there and everyone's risking their lives, if you were there, you're on the ground right? you'd have better security. don't you agree? and i mean and this is this is the guy that runs. yes. he's not there anymore. but this is the guy. but this is a this is a it's it's complicated. it really is. i mean, the the israeli people are the people i know they what they've done since october the seventh is extraordinary. the courage there. but it's lot of it. a lot of the the kids like the ones who are like under 30, they get it the you know, the guys

60, 70. i don't know i don't know what's happened but they've a lot of them have lost way and maybe never had their way. you know, and i'll just say this, like, i don't i hate being critical of israel. it may be it may very well be that the only way to create a state of israel beginning the 1920s and 1930s, was through a intense secular socialist kind of, you know, body politic. you people really needed to subordinate their individual needs and wants to the to the collective hope maybe that was necessary to build the state. and so we have to have a court that of everything they did, whether they were religious or not, whether they were believers, not they built the state and we owe them everything. but things have changed and things have changed dramatically. and if we lose at this point, if we become untethered from, you know, our our biblical legacy, we got nothing left and we have to we have to push that. we have to push that harder. i agree fully. i just the one of the biggest struggles, obviously very, very intelligent over the decades have been pondering how to

resolve this. so it seems it's a case and it seems to me that like just from discussions the average israeli, the reason why have moved away from the one state solution is is always comes down to the following issue, which is that you're going to have a now a millions palestinian arabs in the we'll call inc israel. we don't know the number because they sense they are not accurate. but now you incorporate those and now it's going to it's going to the the the the majority of the coalitions of a jewish state. the only jewish state. so the solution which is suggested is going the direction, as you mentioned, the book is a degree of civil rights, but limited. there's a glass ceiling of sorts in terms certain elements of voting or the ability to build a change. and you cited an example was puerto rico and the united states of america. there's there's there's but there's no representation in congress. but there's the they benefits of many, many, many many federal

benefits at the same time. and you may that made that suggestion i for for for me i guess there's two two avenues of question one is is is in terms of is that is that truly a democracy meaning can it be a jewish and a democratic said at the same time with that where some civil civilians of that state have a glass ceiling in terms of their representation. number one. number two is is in terms of judaism's relationship to that, how does judaism relate to the other and you speak to in the book but sort of ideologically is judaism does judaism believe that everybody who's under the auspices needs to be of equal rights and that same society. and. that's right. i think we have a lot of people are getting stuck how how would you help surmount those hurdles so it's so i mean to start i mean the you know israel just cannot swap a security for a demographic risk i mean it's just it's just not not possible that you could have a solution

would enable in the arab population just by voting to cause israel no longer be a jewish state, which is really where title comes from. there has to be one jewish state. and by the way i, you know, i mean, i. the notion of one jewish state is the title is very important because people need to understand this and i think they do. but i think, you know we need to make this argument more forcefully. there's over 40 muslim states in the world. okay. does anybody care that, you know, there are christian states? i mean, we come from america where, you know, we have a first amendment and we have a separation of church and state. and that's fine. it works great for america. most of the world doesn't like that, right? i mean, there's church of england. you saw the coronation of. what's his name? charles. i mean? it was all it was all church stuff. i mean, it was all you know, it was the anglican anglican church. but as 40 muslim states, you have hindu states, buddhist states, national religions all around the world right and. the main thesis of this book is

so one jewish state, it's like too much to ask we're just one state with collect that where the jewish people have the right of collective self-determination that's it just one never going to be two it's never going to expand. it's the size of new jersey. it's really small. like what? why is the world obsessing one jewish state when there are so states that have national religions? and so that's sort of the point. and the way i look at it like this there israel has has two laws that need to be harmonized and they need to be harmonized in judea and samaria as well. you have the called basic laws, right? that's what calls these quasi constitutional laws. one, basic laws, human dignity. right. which is that every human being doesn't matter religion. you are every human being who is a citizen of the state of israel is entitled to basic human dignity, which includes the rights to to pray to the right, to freedom of worship, freedom of travel freedom of speech. what are all the well, the typical that's the that's the basic basic law of human

dignity. and then there's the nation state law, right. is that whatever rights you have of human dignity, they're all so subordinate. the collective right of the jewish people to self-determination right now. you can imagine a circumstance where those might put up against each other under some limited circumstances. and my to that is okay, you know, life's not perfect. i mean okay so you know israel a as israel a perfect democracy i don't know who cares? like, i mean we're not we don't have to be better than everybody else, especially when it comes to self-governance we, you know, the united states owns puerto rico, it owns guam but owns american samoa. do they vote in national elections? no. is america an apartheid state? no. i mean, it's not, you know. we have, you know, whoever wins you know, if trump wins the election, he's not going to get the popular vote. right. so a majority of americans will have voted for kamala harris, but trump could be the president is that a democracy? how's that a democracy i don't know. i mean it's just it's we only

obsess about this when it comes to israel. i mean you know you make rules that you make and you live with the rules and if your goal is to sure that israel always remains a jewish, then you come up with a system to do. it's not going to affect the lives of of the palestinians that their lives are not going be any worse. you know, in in the emirates, which is, i think, a great country, great country. and i like the people there very much. i'm very fond of the of the leadership there. they've got 10 million people live in there, 1 million of them are citizens. 9 million are guest workers throwing entitled to stay. as long as they have jobs, they lose their jobs. and the next plane home to pakistan or they came from. so anybody care now? i mean, it's like there's only you know, there's so much you can try to achieve perfection in an imperfect world, an incredibly imperfect. you no problem said. so you do the best you can. you maximize the quality of life of the people you live. you try to treat people fairly and with dignity. and by the way, you think right now mean are the are the arab

citizens, israel, all that participatory in the in the election process? i mean not really. i mean, you know, i don't know how many of them vote. it's not it's not as high as the israeli citizens but anyway it's it is a it is it is we do the best we can do to provide you know, to to to live within those two basic laws that that and and by the way, there are other ways to skin the cat. you can just say, look, we could you know, the government could pass a law that says, you know, here are ten things that are immutable. you have to always be. you know, the knesset must have must be 80% jewish, no matter how you vote. you know, there different things or and you would need a 90% majority to to break any of those laws. then, you know, everybody can vote and votes. they're subject to this this constitutional construct. i not to get too deep into the weeds of the governance. if people want to do it, we'll find a way to, you know craft the governance, you know, get some lawyers in a room, figure

it out. you and it can be done. but you know, circumstances that this israel become, you know, a defective state under those circumstances. it's it's it's really coming down to stop apologizing for being jewish. stop, stop being a stop apologizing for having one state. it's just one. that's it. just one state. yeah, but how realistic is it, do you think, to get into the and arab school system and change the curricula? you know, here we breeding a of people are born to hate and and is it realistic to say that the next generation will actually be part of a cohesive cooperative society. it's not a it's it's not an overnight process. but i can tell you, for example, in in jerusalem, right. they started their you know, mostly on is actually done a very good job here by schools. there's a palestinian curriculum and an israeli curriculum and you know you can you can send your kids to wherever you want but there typically haven't been enough israeli curricula schools for palestinians. so mostly on exchange that he's

built a few schools that are in in arab neighborhoods but are under the israeli you know curriculum. i met the parents. right. they don't want take pictures with me. they were afraid. but they said to me, this is the greatest changer we've had because sending our kids to these schools, they're going to become doctors and lawyers okay, the palestinian curriculum, horrible. you know, you go there in the you know when you get out, you don't know anything or, you know, so there is a, you know, there is a large component of arab palestinian society as well that kind of see the world, especially the young james martin. everybody's got you know, everybody's got internet. everybody can see what the world looks like. so they want they want what everybody else wants. i mean, they see enormous opportunities. they're not impoverished, not living like they're living in gaza. and they understand that you to be to advance, you need to be able to you know, this this is an information agencies in a technology age, you need to go

to school and learn programing or computer science or physics or math or whatever. and that's what they wanted. the parents all want that for their kids. and so it's a question of priorities. you, again, and it's easy for me to say all these things and want to kind of just take a little dose. you we should have some humility here. you know, it's easy to criticize israel. they haven't had one day of peace since 1948. right. so, i mean, easy to say. well, israel should do this, this and this. and i say this, you know, with love, not criticism. they're still at war with lebanon, still at war with syria, since 1948, still at war with iraq, you know, the peace with jordan. and egypt is. not the not the warmest you ever see. and and they got problems, you know, as bibi says, he's fighting a war now with seven fronts, right. so we got to give him a break. right. have to i mean, they this is this is easy. okay. to think forward a year or two years, three years to them, you know, future is like next week. i understand i understand the issues.

but there will come a point. there will come a point where israel will prevail over its enemies. and it has to start thinking about how do we how do we, you know, preserve our values 100 years or more. and so hopefully, again, this is not in any way an overnight process, but it is a process. we can start just just judging, going back to the the peace plan of the previous the administration, which you are so actively involved. and i remember that that ultimately the the looming threat israel announcing sovereignty over the jordan valley and was ultimately what gave the arbitrage as you mentioned in your previous book to create the abraham accords which was the changing the face of the middle east and the reason it was so successful in that sense was because the arab states were able to were able to the moderate arab states were able to say that protecting the palestinian brethren by making peace and therefore the sovereignty on the shelf, but that ultimately demonstrates that there is a great fear among even the moderate states to create to to allow israel to announce sovereignty.

that being the case, then how can such a bold plan how could such a bold idea ever gain traction if even the moderate states are about this type of this type of action? i mean, what they're concerned about primarily is being perceived as having abandoned. the palestinian cause. and so what you really need is to is to substitute the the the palestinians state for some other treatment of the palestinian people that where people can look them in the eye and say, look, we got something for you now, look, they they didn't you know, the emirates didn't require that we originally they said you have to any plans to for sovereignty any portion of judea and samaria or the jordan valley. i remember that negotiation. i was, you know, negotiating this. we were coming looking at a thesaurus for words that we could live with, both live with. and we came up with word suspend because suspended by its terms is temporary and it and and it was a four year deal which expired two weeks ago.

right so the deal that israel made with the emirates expired, that was also part of the sense of my for this book i wanted to it out so the emirates didn't say you can never do this. they said, you know, don't do it for four years. let's see if we can make some progress. look, there was there is privately the all these countries understand who are the palestinians and the danger they present to the region hamas. everybody's you know, all the all the all the moderate nations at war with hamas or the muslim brotherhood or whatever iteration there is. everyone knows them mahmoud abbas is a crook. he's corrupt. he he he takes money, gives it to his friends and deprives i mean, there's nobody in the palestinian world who looks at mahmoud abbas and says, you know, we hope you get a state and you rule us. it's not it's not what people want. so it's a lot of a lot of it is is stagecraft, how to put this together in a way in which

there's face saving. and, you know, people can stand up and and feel good about the outcome from all perspectives. but again, i can't emphasize this enough like we wouldn't even begin to start about this with the the arabs until we knew that this is something was interesting to the to the --. like, you know, like that's what's the point what's the point of getting going down the road if you're not going to if. and so that's that's really the issue. i mean, the first issue is to really just look at, again, if if the people of israel by some you know by majority it is a democracy. i respect the democracy. after after all this process, they say, look we don't want it. i mean, i would be deeply disappointed, but i'd also respect it because, you know, they're the ones who have to live with it. and, you know, if i was living there, maybe i'd feel differently. i mean, we're going to argue. i'd argue my, i'd argue too much. so i was horse. why it's a mistake. but, you know, they have the right to there's a right to determine their their future. i don't think it's going to happen. i really don't think if we take

the right of time and treat people with respect and we don't try to ram it through and don't try to, you know, tell people why they're bad -- or why they don't it it's got to be done with with love and respect and information, i don't think. well i don't think we have that problem. i, i certainly hope so. i'm optimistic. i always actually, david, when we have a conversation, i'm always optimistic because you have a way of through a lot of dark clouds and seeing there's a reason beyond them. and i. this leads me just a final question. i'm going to open up 2 to 3 audience questions. so i'm trying to think of something she's not been asked yet. and just a last question, which is it seems to me that this is just a pragmatic solution. it's not just the best of the things we could figure out doing this isn't an ideological solution. this is something which you spend time, i imagine, more than ten, 15 weeks time. i imagine it was it was a little overlap. but this is something which which is which is based based on ideology. can you just speak the fact of

of you've touched on this before is, the idea of something which is rooted in ideology rather than simply pragmatic actually secure? well, look, you know, in book, i talk about i talk about the the fact, you know, why is semitism why is anti-zionism anti-semitic and why is it necessary, the jewish people to have the land of. i'm no rabbi, you know, and i hope got it right. i hope i got some of these things right. at least i probably made some mistakes. but but but the point is that you know the biblical prophecy right is is about the return of the jewish people, the land of israel. in fact, moses, you know, predicted the expulsion of the -- from the land of israel and their return, even though he wasn't there to watch their their initial entry. but, you know, i say a jeremiah ezekiel, i their prophecies so profound and moving i even referred to you know, at that i

spoke to john paul him, you know, when they found out that their son died and said, you know, this is this is real excited by now. this is the modern iteration of rock island of aqaba and that rachel poland she crying for a son but then again but then jeremiah says okay you shovel but it will it will work out okay. i think that the i think i don't think judaism survives without the land of israel. and i think the full land of israel think at this juncture we can't not going to go through another exile. we're going we're either going to, you know, plant our roots forever in this lands or we're just going to disappear over some over 50 or 100 years or whatever. maybe we'll pockets here and there. but i don't think we really have another exile. you know as a people. and so it's to me, it's now or never and it's about about preserving the jewish character for our children and our grandchildren and making sure that that that we survive and, you know, we've gotten gotten

you know, we've lasted this long, you know, through through bigger challenges, far bigger challenges than we're facing today. um, we just can't let go. we can't live like, oh, this, of this legacy, this continuum that we've been privileged be part of. so yeah, it's very much, it's personal. it's not like when i tell you about the book, it is that you can read the book. i say, look, you can be a you can be a person of deep faith. you'll have the book. you can actually be person completely secular and still love the because it gets you to an outcome that you think is good. you can be pro-palestinian, you know the bucking me pro israeli you know you can there's something in this for everybody. i tried to write a book where no matter how you process conflict in your head, it's a good outcome for everybody. i think that's the difference between the approaches of you know many the people in the israeli right the politicians on the israeli don't have the the perspective of of of of how to make the case to the world you know, to them it's simple and. it's about, you know, you the

more land we get, you know, the off we are. and who cares about the you know? and i tell them, look, it's i get it. you know, you're on the ground i understand it. but if you really want to make the case to the world, it's got to be a holistic solution. you got to deal with everything. you've got to deal with all the way. and that's what that's why i mean, this book, people will call me a colonizer and you know whatever, they'll call me. but it's really a good for everybody. if you really care about human rights and human dignity, it's the best outcome. but but it's, you know, for me, it's personal. it's very personal. you know, again, those who knew my father and knew how committed he was to see judea and samaria and to especially to it's a big deal, along with along with rosie's parents, you know, i mean, these you know, these these places are really you speak to us, speak to us very, very deeply. yeah. rabbi jonathan, sex is to say that non--- i the -- are embarrassed of the judaism and proud of -- or proud of the judaism. yeah, and thank you for being a proud --.

making us proud the --. thank you. really. you know, ask that anybody who has a question rabbi. i actually a microphone. um, please. yes, we have a question. stay on the back rub over here in the fire. just just remember it's on tape, everybody. we do. we need that. we need that. we need the mike. rosie we need the mic. it's like, you know, now we need we need the microphone for the recording we need the microphone for the recording sorry, i just wanted to say that the 7000 that marched and protested after the six had died, the israelis they are so set in their they call religious people messianic states and they're very strong. they're not 20, 30 years old. 40. there's so of them who are very difficult to bring them back to a different idea. what do you think about that? i think you're right. i think you're right i think we just have to we to we have to love them a little harder in.

the end and a lot of them their kids don't agree. and i think, you know, people don't people don't realize how many parents there are of of hostages who have come out and said, don't rescue my son if it means losing the war. i mean you know, it takes for parents to say that's so, um, there's, you know, look, we are and i'm chérif. we're, we're, we're, we're stiff necks, but we can't we can't give up. and i'm know look, i the advantage, at least here is like like when you see crazy in america, it's easy to really dislike them. you know, i don't just like these people because i know that deep down they love israel and they're patriots and their children have fought in army and we have to treat them with love and respect and get them to the right place like that one guy, you know, um, but you know, like the government will the, the israeli, the israeli political process will run its course and we'll get past it. i think i'm optimistic. i think i'm optimistic cause,

you know, you know, you know this that the the people, by and large, the people are just incredible. the greatest people in, the world. and they will get government they deserve and they will get the leadership they deserve. i'm not saying they don't have a now i'm not making political comments, but i'm just it will be it will be okay long as god protects us. first of all, thank you. it's wonderful to have you here. one question, have you been in touch with former president trump and do you believe that he's reelected? he will ask you to serve ambassador? yeah, i think you get a prize because the 400th person who's asked me that question so which and the answer is so the answer the the answer. first of all, you got to be really the right person to ask is really my wife okay she really that's really her decision because. i put her through this one. so i'm going to do it again without her without her approval. yeah. like serving. it's it's an indescribable honor

and joy to be able to serve the united states in an area where you care so much about and where america can be. so impact on the un, the state of israel if i have that chance again i would do it. it's up to president trump. we have not he has not offered me anything and that we haven't talked about that he doesn't he doesn't do i and harris he doesn't give out. he doesn't give out jobs until he's elected. but we were you know, we talk and we text and and, you know, if he wins. and i, i think he will it'll be he'll make that decision. and then we'll figure it out. you know, that's i have to say that i agree with just about everything said except for one thing, there's no thing as palestinian. i'm 83 years old. i 84 and less to months. i have a long memory and i

remember the arab line that was only one arab nation. there may be 20 some arab states, but it all belong to the arabs. whole middle east. after they lost one of their wars with israel, yasser arafat, who was the of the palestine liberation organization, which today is the palestine authority, said, oh, we're palestinians. he was an egyptian, by the way. we have palestine 1%. they invented themselves as a new nation, kind of a history. i'm going to ask, is that a quest just to get to a question? okay. okay. i don't disagree with anything you just said, by the way. okay. yeah, yeah. so can you the question is, could you please stop calling. i you know, i give me a give me another word. i mean i'm open i'm open to other words. yeah. arabs. okay, fine. thank you. bye bye. my book is a complete agreement

with you just said, by the way. so yeah, i want to take a moment to really think david and tammy and david thank you for your in time thank you for being an optimistic what it means to be a proud --. and thank you for representing us. so just tell me, you know, i didn't get i didn't get to sign everybody's books. so should i just sit over there on the way? absolutely. so we gonna do is is that i'm and david is going to be just towards the entrance you could give him a chance to get there and there are books for sale right outside at $3 for each of the books. and if, if ambassador friedman has time you will able to to sign them. but we are also going in a few minutes time do a ma'ariv. just i'm going to sign i'm. going to sign everybody's book stop never home. so we're all yeah, i really thank you. and david, thank you for here thank you to me for being and i want to say special recognition i want to ask who's joining us this evening. out of