Yitzḥak Navon, who died last week, was a playwright, poet, and statesman who served as president of Israel from 1978 to 1983. Reflecting on Navon’s life and legacy, Marc Angel looks to the patriarch Isaac:

In this week’s Torah portion, we read a famous passage that had been uttered by our forefather Isaac. When he was trying to determine the identity of the son who stood before him, Isaac said, “The voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.” While this verse is often understood as a sign of confusion on Isaac’s part, it also can be understood in another way. . . .

[Previously], Isaac had favored Esau, who was strong, ruddy, and warlike. But he must also have realized that a nation cannot be founded upon brute force alone. . . . When Jacob appeared before Isaac, he was dressed as though he were Esau. I believe Isaac saw through the ruse—but was very impressed. Now he understood: Jacob was not simply a passive, quiet idealist; he was ingenious and gutsy; he was able to outsmart Esau. Isaac then said, “The voice is the voice of Jacob”: it is a sweet, gentle, and kind voice. But “the hands are the hands of Esau”: Jacob had mustered the inner strength to take risks, to combat his brother.

The combination of a peace-loving voice and strong arms willing to wage battle was the right combination for a leader of a nation. . . . I think the words of our forefather Isaac can be aptly applied to our modern-day Yitzḥak Navon. His voice was the voice of peace, tolerance, mutual respect. He exuded kindness, warmth, [and] a perpetual smile. But his hands were the hands of Esau. When necessary, Yitzḥak Navon stood strong and courageously to defend his nation. He was a warrior who never lost his vision of peace.

While conventional wisdom in the Western press believes that the war with Hamas has left Jerusalem more isolated and scuttled chances of expanding the Abraham Accords, Gabriel Scheinmann points to a very different reality. He begins with Iran’s massive drone and missile attack on Israel last month, and the coalition that helped defend against it:

America’s Arab allies had, in various ways, provided intelligence and allowed U.S. and Israeli planes to operate in their airspace. Jordan, which has been vociferously attacking Israel’s conduct in Gaza for months, even publicly acknowledged that it shot down incoming Iranian projectiles. When the chips were down, the Arab coalition held and made clear where they stood in the broader Iranian war on Israel.

The successful batting away of the Iranian air assault also engendered awe in Israel’s air-defense capabilities, which have performed marvelously throughout the war. . . . Israel’s response to the Iranian night of missiles should give further courage to Saudi Arabia to codify its alignment. Israel . . . telegraphed clearly to Tehran that it could hit precise targets without its aircraft being endangered and that the threshold of a direct Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear or other sites had been breached.

The entire episode demonstrated that Israel can both hit Iranian sites and defend against an Iranian response. At a time when the United States is focused on de-escalation and restraint, Riyadh could see quite clearly that only Israel has both the capability and the will to deal with the Iranian threat.

It is impossible to know whether the renewed U.S.-Saudi-Israel negotiations will lead to a normalization deal in the immediate months ahead. . . . Regardless of the status of this deal, [however], or how difficult the war in Gaza may appear, America’s Arab allies have now become Israel’s.