Israel needs the Palestinians as a perpetual enemy to justify the occupation

Peace with the Palestinians will open the door wide for the vast majority of Arab and Muslim countries to normalize relations with Israel, which will have far-reaching economic, and especially geostrategic and security benefits.

Peace with the Palestinians will pull the rug from underneath Iran, which uses the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to justify its hostility toward Israel. Moreover, Tehran will be compelled to end its "existential" threats against Israel, especially if the Arab Gulf states enter into a security alliance with Israel, which is being discussed.

Peace with the Palestinians will force Hezbollah, Iran's proxy in Lebanon, and Palestinian extremists such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad, to reevaluate their position towards Israel, as peace would severely erode the foundation of their resistance.

Peace with the Palestinians will repair the dangerously widening political schism between Israeli Jews who seek to end the occupation and those who don't, as well as between Israeli Arabs and Jews. Peace would help generate social cohesiveness, which is central to Israel's domestic security and stability.

Peace with the Palestinians will dramatically improve the fraught relationship between Israel and the American Jewish community, which overwhelmingly supports ending the conflict based on a two-state solution.

Peace with the Palestinians would mitigate to some degree the rise of antisemitism, which countless people the world over ascribe in no small measure to Israel's treatment of the Palestinians in the occupied territories.

Peace with the Palestinians will not poison the minds of another generation of Israelis who live under the illusion that they can prosper and be safe only if they remain in control of the territories and thwart the Palestinians' aspirations for statehood.

Peace with the Palestinians will save Israel the additional hundreds of millions of dollars that it allocates to security in the West Bank, which it could alternatively invest in gentrification of scores of debilitated Israeli neighborhoods, improving the infrastructure and housing in many poor communities desperate for a dignified and humane standard of living.

Peace with the Palestinians will project Israel in a new light to the community of nations. Instead of being condemned and criticized because of the occupation, it will be praised for its courage and fortitude and for righting the wrong while enhancing its national security.

Finally, peace with the Palestinians will free the Israelis from the heavy and distasteful moral burden of the occupation, which they have been carrying for more than five decades.

Ending the occupation on moral and practical grounds The Bennett government, however tenuous it may be, should treat the spree of Palestinian attacks as a wakeup call and begin a process of healing with the Palestinians. Instead of resorting to even more oppressive and ruthless measures in the West Bank, presumably to prevent future attacks, such brutal measures will only galvanize the Palestinians' resistance and potentially lead to a massive violent uprising. Thousands of Palestinian youth will be prepared to sacrifice themselves instead of living despondent and despairing, with no prospect of ever being free and realizing their dreams. It is now only a question of time when they will rise, unless Israel realizes that the occupation is the recipe for a disaster and acts to end it, for its own sake just as much as for the Palestinians.

Israel does not need a perpetual enemy to survive, and it can no longer justify the occupation on the basis of national security concerns. Israel's birth was the triumph of what's right and moral over the worst of all evils. It was the moral responsibility of the community of nations in the wake of the Holocaust that carried Israel into existence. Israel's strength, permanence, and fortune rests on that moral foundation, which is, and will always be, the essence of its very being.

Only by raising that moral torch high in pursuit of what is right and just, will Israel ensure its continuing existence as a democracy, free and independent, living in safety and security, that no enemy can challenge with impunity.