The near endless failures of peace-making in the Middle East are due to our not thinking like the locals.

Imagine being in an intense negotiation with a Chinese firm.

Let’s go way back to the days before Google Translate and imagine that the CCP jailed your translator overnight.

The two sides sit at a table but cannot understand each other.

They try to use pictures or sign language to get their points across, but to no avail.

Nothing progresses because neither side understands the other.

Donald Trump has many firsts in his two presidencies.

He moved the U.S.

embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, something that his predecessors promised but never did.

He has more recently cleaned up Washington fountains and parks.

He said that his father told him that if the entrance to a restaurant is dirty, then the establishment itself is no better.

America’s capital, especially during this 250th year of celebrations, should look like the seat of power of the greatest country in the world.

Donald Trump has negotiated trade agreements favorable to U.S.

coffers and companies.

The man literally wrote the book on negotiations.

With all of the above in mind and plenty of previous articles praising the president and his associates, I need to write the words below.

Many people have concluded that the modern expression of Islam is incompatible with Western life.

The recent destruction in Paris at the hands of immigrants primarily from Islamic countries is only one of the endless cases of Islam in the West bringing death, mayhem, and threats to the end of the Western way of life.

Western-trained people and Muslims often do not think the same way.

Let’s use an example.

Imagine Coca-Cola and Pepsi negotiating a joint venture.

Even if the discussions become tense and acrimonious, nobody would expect Pepsi to burn down a Coke bottling plant or for Coke to assassinate Pepsi’s CEO.

There might be lawsuits or some industrial espionage to get a leg up on the negotiations.

But that’s about it.

Yet when Yassir Arafat did not get Israel to give him what he wanted, like the entry of several million "refugees" into Israel via a ginned-up “right of return,” he sent his terrorists off to blow up Israelis.

John Kerry thought that he had negotiated a ceasefire in Gaza but “forgot” to tell Hamas.

When two Israeli soldiers entered a tunnel, they were killed, and their bodies kept for a decade.

Hezbollah has killed 14 Israeli soldiers in the most recent “ceasefire,” while Iran has used the break in fighting to open its missile tunnels for access to their ballistic cache.

Most previous wars were fought with local, short ceasefires to allow for the removal of wounded, the exchange of prisoners, or the exit of civilians.

The long ceasefires in the Middle East are generally used by Muslim combatants to continue their attacks and improve their position for the resumption of formal hostilities.

Donald Trump’s only obligation in the Middle East is to the safety and well-being of the American people.

If he gets what he wants and leaves Iranian citizens, Gulf states, and Israel high and dry, he has every right to do the same.

Of course, it would be nice if some future agreement or outcome was outwardly good for everybody, but Donald Trump is president of the United States, not World Field Marshal.

When he recently told Israel to stand down from attacking Hezbollah’s neighborhoods in Beirut, Bibi Netanyahu had no choice but to comply.

While the loonies on the Right like to peddle “Bibi owns Donald,” the reality is that the enormous support given to Israel by the United States....