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"Soft power" of USAid has been one of the principal and indispensable tools in winning the Cold War and instrumental in advancing and maintaining democracies and peace in the world, including the Middle East.

Aid to Israel comes back not only as purchase contracts for military equipment and munitions, but also as valuable cooperation in military, medical/biotech, STEM and other R&D.

Focusing on Israel as the source of problems in the ME - as the Soviet and later Islamist propaganda have done for decades - is misplaced and simply ignores the history and both tribal and religious issues in the region.

For example, nearly 14 centuries of war between Sunni and Shi'a Muslims; expulsion of Hashemites by Wahhabis from what is now Saudi Arabia in 1919-1925 - one of many Arab "Nakba"s in ME; the centuries of occupations by different Arab and non-Arab entities, like Ottoman Empire occupation of Levant (including "Palestine") until early 20th century (though Turkiye, under Erdogan, is making its way back, initially as a 'protector' to Syria); Trans-Jordan occupation of "Palestine West Bank" etc., etc.

Also ignored is that several major Arab countries, like Egypt, Jordan, UAE and others either have or expressed interest in formal peace treaties or informal peaceful and trading relationship with Israel, and have had their own long-standing problems with Palestinian factions who can't even settle on single leadership - IOW, no one to talk to about whatever the peace with them would look like.

Last attempt at statehood - with Yassir Arafat in 1993-2000 - resulted only in him getting some international legitimacy for himself and Fatah, then using it to ignite Second Intifada (2000-2005), which ended with much worse economic conditions for Palestinians, who before that had one of the best standards of living in Arab world due to trade and work in Israel or working for Israeli companies in the WB and Gaza. In economic terms, Israelis didn't mind having a "trade deficit" with Palestinians.

Leaderships of Palestinians have had many opportunities (at least, four) to have their own independent state(s), but rejected them to either join other Arab countries waging wars against Israel, or using Intifadas and terrorism to achieve 'Palestine' free of Jews, "from the River to the Sea."

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