One of the foremost figures in post-World War II Yiddish literature, Chaim Grade is best known for his works of fiction. But in the 1930s he began his literary career—in the then-Polish city of Vilna—as a poet. He wrote the poem “Jewish Towns of Poland” in Paris in 1947; in it, the evidently Jewish speaker travels through what had by now become a judenrein country. To great effect, Grade populates the shtetls with biblical figures, as in the following excerpt, from a new translation by Julian Levinson:

Jewish towns of Poland, you blazed in my heart and my memory,
Like the places in the Holy Land that lit up the pages of Torah.
My childhood years were barefoot steps over a river that passed my home, which became my Jordan.
And now every wall I see is a ruin of the Western Wall,
And as once in Bethlehem, a lament rises from the streets of Krakow. . . .

Dear [Matriarchs] from the Yiddish Bibles, Rachel and Leah of the women’s prayers,
You sat on the porches with all the women of the town.
Angels who accompanied Jacob, where will you find peace?
You have become orphaned guests, condemned to wander and beg.
And you, Patriarchs from Canaan, once at home in this land of the Poles,
You who stood like a divide between barman and drunken peasants,
The way back to heaven has been closed off to you
Because you walked along our streets, wearing our clothes.

The heavens no longer recognize you, and you gaze out, terrified, from
A trampled hedge, from a ruined gate,
Like a pious old Jew from a tiny village,
Who wakes from his Sabbath nap to find the world has turned upside-down.
The boys no longer stroll with girls on the riverbank,
And no longer do buses avoid the town on Sabbath,
The uncircumcised sit like honored men at the doors of Jews,
They have torn the siding from the stores,
The holy books thrown away, the wooden synagogue destroyed.

In 2003, the Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, spooked by the American display of might in Iraq, decided to destroy or surrender his entire nuclear program. Informed observers have suggested that the deal he made with the U.S. should serve as a model for any agreement with Iran. Robert Joseph provides some useful background:

Gaddafi had convinced himself that Libya would be next on the U.S. target list after Iraq. There was no reason or need to threaten Libya with bombing as Gaddafi was quick to tell almost every visitor that he did not want to be Saddam Hussein. The images of Saddam being pulled from his spider hole . . . played on his mind.

President Bush’s goal was to have Libya serve as an alternative model to Iraq. Instead of war, proliferators would give up their nuclear programs in exchange for relief from economic and political sanctions.

Any outcome that permits Iran to enrich uranium at any level will fail the one standard that President Trump has established: Iran will not be allowed to have a nuclear weapon. Limiting enrichment even to low levels will allow Iran to break out of the agreement at any time, no matter what the agreement says.

Iran is not a normal government that observes the rules of international behavior or fair “dealmaking.” This is a regime that relies on regional terror and brutal repression of its citizens to stay in power. It has a long history of using negotiations to expand its nuclear program. Its negotiating tactics are clear: extend the negotiations as long as possible and meet any concession with more demands.