W hen you’re a real estate man everything takes the form of a potential deal to be closed even the Middle East. From his executive’s chair in the Oval Office Donald Trump sees the conflicted region through the eyes of a businessman and an entrepreneur. In his view the Arab-Israeli conflict is just another sort of real estate deal to be negotiated — admittedly more complicated and challenging than any of the previous deals of his career but basically a matter of real estate. And Trump is a man whose personal lexicon doesn’t include the word “failure.” According to his worldview his delegates will have to find a way to reallocate parcels of land dividing them between the Israelis and the Palestinians in such a way as to satisfy both sides more or less and if they aren’t satisfied they’ll just have to be convinced by some means or other to accept the terms of the deal. And of course you don’t need to be a prophet to guess who will end up making the biggest and most painful concessions. Cash on the barrelhead naturally.

And we’re already paying. The Israeli right has slowly been disabused of its euphoric fantasy that with a new man in the White House Israel could build towns all over Judea and Samaria at last. For all intents and purposes there is no difference between Trump’s recent statements and the policy of the Obama administration regarding the settlements. There may be a distinct difference in tone but the letdown comes with the same bump. And what about the solemn promise to move the American embassy to Jerusalem? The White House is “looking into it.” In other words the embassy move will probably have to wait for the next president’s promises.

To see how President Trump views the Arab-Israeli conflict as a real estate problem you need look no further than toward the man he chose to try to pull the negotiations out of the mud. Jason Greenblatt has served as Trump’s faithful attorney for some 20 years. An Orthodox Jew (which could put him at a certain disadvantage for this task) Greenblatt has put through many successful real estate deals for his boss. Now if what we’re looking at really is just a real estate deal albeit on a grand scale then President Trump has chosen the right person for the job.

But what we know is that the plan is doomed from the outset despite his success rate until now. Trump though doesn’t know this and how should he? Although given his pride and his strong determination that he can bring peace to the Middle East where all his predecessors have failed he is headed for a hard fall if he continues in this impetuous style.

What we know and what he’ll eventually learn is that this is no ordinary dispute over territory. It is a spiritual war that goes back to ancient times and has yet to be won — it’s the conflict between Yitzchak and Yishmael recorded in Chumash Bereishis. The classic commentators tell us that the ultimate redemption of Israel and indeed of the whole world depends on the resolution of this conflict at the End of Days. It is war taking place in the Heavenly realms and with all his good will Trump can do nothing to end it. Perhaps he will succeed in bringing about some sort of truce in the meantime; let us hope so. But real peace? That is simply beyond human reach.

The words of Rav Moshe Cordovero (on Zohar Va’eira) give us a fleeting glimpse into the future as the process unfolds: “And the children of Yishmael are destined at that time to rouse all the peoples of the world to come to make war over Jerusalem… because they established a kingdom and it will be a time of trouble for Yaakov. They will not come to destruction however but will be saved from it.”

What are the main points in this outline of things to come? One a war on (or over) Jerusalem. Two the Arabs will instigate the nations of the world to join them in this war. Three the war will be attributed to the fact that Bnei Yisrael established a kingdom that is a sovereign state. This citation is but one of many sources that outline a similar map of the Geulah to come may it be speedily in our days.

Of course President Trump can’t be expected to know any of this. But what about the three Orthodox Jews who have reached high positions of power around him — Jared Kushner Jason Greenblatt and the newly appointed ambassador to Israel David Friedman? Do they know nothing about this process? If they did would they get involved this Middle Eastern adventure? Haven’t they heard that “as in the days of your exodus from the land of Egypt I will show him wonders” (Michah 7:15) that the resolution of the conflict in Israel will surely come but it will be stamped only with the seal of the Creator? For the problem to be solved here is not a territorial dispute but the problem of redeeming the Jewish People and all of humanity. So have the neviim promised in Hashem’s Name and so do we see before our eyes the laying of the groundwork for the promise’s fulfillment.

If so should these precious Jews get involved with a lost cause?

Not only are they incapable of bringing peace by any earthly means capable and talented as they are but in this particular context the fact that they are Jewish is an additional liability. First of all it is hard to imagine the Arabs giving any credence to religious Jews as Trump’s emissaries. They will always be suspected of bias toward the Israeli side in the negotiations (if they even come to the point of conducting negotiations) and they may overcompensate in disproving this perception by pressuring Israel.

Furthermore seeing Orthodox Jews in high positions of power should in itself be cause for concern.

Throughout history many Jews have become close to their rulers in exile. They have held high positions and wielded great influence in courts of royalty. But the scope of their influence has always been matched by the fervor of their opponents fanned by anti-Semitism to bring them down. And when the Jewish advisor to the king fell the Jewish community sometimes paid the price at times with exile at times in bloody pogroms. This repeated cycle has pretty much functioned as a natural law of the Jewish experience in galus. As Shlomo Hamelech said pride goes before a fall. So should we not be concerned?

President Trump and his administration have many enemies including a majority of secular American Jews who supported Clinton and surely harbor deep animosity toward the Orthodox Jews now wielding power in Washington. The religious Jews in charge of Israeli affairs in the American government are likely to fail like all their predecessors but unlike those predecessors no excuses will be made for them and in the end we might be looking at a massive smear campaign by liberal Jews against Orthodoxy in general. Now you might say that times have changed that America is different now. But who will vouch for that? (Originally featured in Mishpacha Issue 657)