In 1949, following Israel’s War of Independence, which overcame an Arab military attempt to eradicate the reborn Jewish State, Prime Minister Ben Gurion was aware that appeasing rogue regimes would provide a tailwind to radicalism and terrorism. Therefore, he repulsed the aggressive US and global pressure to concede land acquired during a defensive war (“land-for-peace”) to Arab aggressors. Israel’s area was expanded by 50%, to 8,000sqm, and the liberated areas of Western Jerusalem, the Galilee, the Negev and the Triangle were resettled. Thus, Ben Gurion’s rejection of “land-for-peace” upgraded, dramatically, Israel’s posture of deterrence, and motivated the Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs-of-Staff, General Omar Bradley, to recommend the upgrading of Israel’s stature to a major strategic ally of the US. That recommendation was rejected by the US State Department, the mentor of “land-for-peace.”
