Is Trump Being Lured Into Quicksand?

I see that Donald Trump is purring about how he’d like to be the one that brings peace to the Middle East. Seems he thinks he is this great deal maker and that this would be the ultimate challenge to his skills. Of course, it’s a laudable aspiration. It seems like every U.S. president seeks to do it. In my lifetime, I think only Bill Clinton appeared to get any traction in his peace initiative, but that evaporated, and we are left with the fact that no president seems able to make that mark in history.

It’s an easy prediction that Mr. Trump will fail to bring a sustained peace. Think about it. How’s he going to do that? Is he going to bribe the participants? Will he threaten them? How do you convince people who have made the destruction of a people a religious tenet? How do you get them to risk their wellbeing by making peace with the country their neighbors want to destroy? And how do you persuade people to give up anything that would endanger their fragile grasp on a homeland that is surrounded by enemies who desire their annihilation? And how do you trust any promises made by someone you know will not have the power to keep them in another 8 years? The fears are too deep seated. It will take the Prince of Peace to bring that peace to the Middle East.