NATIONAL REVIEW
The Folly of Negotiating with Hamas
Andrews C. McCarthy
August 22, 2026

…The White House doesn’t see conflicts of interest because it fancies Trump (he of the multiple bankruptcies) as a boffo business dealmaker, and sees business — commerce — as transcendent. To repeat what I’ve opined before, President Trump not only fails to grasp the sharia supremacist ideology of the Iranian regime, Hamas, the Taliban, et al.; even as he sits in messes of his own making due specifically to cluelessness about how our enemies’ ideology dictates their actions, he doesn’t see the point of trying to understand them. He is biddable, and he calculates that his counterparties are, too. An ideological contest — the West’s principles against Islamist principles — is outside his framework. It’s just another deal, and our enemies’ anti-American, antisemitic, and anti-Western stances are dismissed as so much puffery until we finally arrive at a price to close what can be sold to the public as a spectacular deal. READ MORE

JPOST Jared Kushner is the latest victim of the Oslo Syndrome In his 2005 book, The Oslo Syndrome: Delusions of a People Under Siege Kenneth Levin coined the phrase “The Oslo Syndrome” to describe the relentless, irrational pursuit of peace at all costs by the Israeli public and its political leadership that began with the 1993 Oslo Accords. The name references The Stockholm Syndrome, a better-known Scandinavian ailment that manifests when a captive develops an emotional bond with their captor…The [Oslo Syndrome] bug has not gone away, and no vaccine has been found. New victims keep showing up, oblivious to their affliction and ready to forge peace. The latest patient appears to be none other than Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law. Kushner’s official government title is “United States Special Envoy for Peace Missions.” Never has a patient embraced his affliction so wholeheartedly and energetically.

NATIONAL REVIEW Elliott Abrams:Kushner Legitimizes Hamas Would a refusal to meet with the leader of Hamas be standing on ceremony, or refusing to see reality? On the contrary it would be acknowledging the reality that Hamas is a murderous terror organization that has committed bestial massacres — and then celebrated them. The sad truth is that the Kushner meeting is a real victory for Hamas, which will use it to demand a larger role as a diplomatic and political presence in the Middle East. This is exactly what the United States should be against and should be preventing, not encouraging.