While Iran took a five week pounding by US and Israeli strikes, it was able to maintain a consistent rate of ballistic missile and drone fire at Israel, US bases and the Arab Gulf states. Iran says they want a permanent end to the many violent conflicts of the Near East. So Iran should learn from the 1979 peace treaty signed by Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat that was witnessed by President Jimmy Carter at the White House that is still alive, even though Hamas opposed a two state solution, and wants all the land between the Mediterranean Sea and the River Jordan. 

Hamas violently opposed the Oslo peace accords negotiated by Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in the mid-1990s.

Gaza peace activist Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib said “There’s a reason why the Palestinians have no state 77 years after the establishment of the state of Israel. It’s their awful leadership that goes back to the pan-Arabism of the Nasser days, and that has adopted different ideologies – the secular PLO [Palestine Liberation Organization], the Marxist PFLP [Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine], or Islamist Hamas – to sell different versions of the same narrative: We’re going to liberate all of Palestine.” But more than 50,000 people in the Gaza Strip have been killed, a figure that includes about 20,000 Hamas terrorists Israel says it killed in battle; plus 2,000 Hamas gunmen killed inside Israel during  the Hamas’ October 7 invasion.

Like most Reform Rabbis I believe that peace will replace war only if  “From River to Sea Both Sides Must Free Themselves Of Hatred and Suffering” 

In Arabic, the word Jihad is a noun meaning the activity of “striving and/or persevering.” According to Prophet Muhammad there are two types of Jihad: minor and major. Once when Muslims were returning from a military expedition, which for Prophet Muhammad was a minor jihad. He said to the fighters that now they had to go through the major jihad. When Prophet Muhammad was asked what he meant by major jihad, he said it was the spiritual jihad. 

On another occasion, Prophet Muhammad said the real mujahid is the one who declares jihad against his/her carnal soul. (Tirmidhi). Exercising self-control and using willpower and reason to overcome one’s anger is described by Prophet Muhammad as “the........

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