Last week, news broke that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of al-Qaeda’s 9/11 attacks, had accepted a plea deal in an American military court. He agreed to plead guilty in exchange for life in prison, thus saving himself from the possibility of execution. A few days afterward, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin countermanded the deal, requiring the arch-terrorist, known as KSM, to stand trial before a military tribunal. Not among the 2,977 counts of first-degree murder being brought against him is the 2002 slaying of the American journalist Daniel Pearl, which KSM described thus: “I decapitated with my blessed right hand the head of the American Jew, Daniel Pearl.”

Joe Nocera speaks with Daniel’s father, the distinguished computer scientist and tireless defender of Israel Judea Pearl, about the case:

As a moral issue, it is clear that my son’s murder should be part of the charges. . . . Changing the possibility of a death sentence to life imprisonment sounds like they are reducing the sentence, which sends a bad message to the world. It suggests there were some kind of extenuating circumstances, that his crime was not as horrible as we had thought, or that he had expressed some regret or become less inhumane. But all of that is wrong.

A new trial should start with a new charge about KSM’s responsibility for the murder of my son. Witnesses must be called, evidence must be considered, and new charges must be brought. If the allegations for murdering Danny are not brought up in court, then the KSM prosecution will always be incomplete.

The pragmatic fact is that there are thousands and thousands of young Muslims who view KSM as a hero—the one who had the guts to stand up to the evil United States. Our job is to tell those young people that KSM is a criminal, not a hero. He is a criminal, and not only a criminal but a unique type of criminal, and that’s why the death penalty is important.

In a momentous meeting with the Syrian president Ahmed al-Sharaa in Riyadh, President Trump announced that he is lifting sanctions on the beleaguered and war-torn country. On the one hand, Sharaa is an alumnus of Islamic State and al-Qaeda, who came to power as commander of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which itself began life as al-Qaeda’s Syrian offshoot; he also seems to enjoy the support of Qatar. On the other hand, he overthrew the Assad regime—a feat made possible by the battering Israel delivered to Hizballah—greatly improving Jerusalem’s strategic position, and ending one of the world’s most atrocious and brutal tyrannies. President Trump also announced that he hopes Syria will join the Abraham Accords.

This analysis by Eran Lerman was published a few days ago, and in some respects is already out of date, but more than anything else I’ve read it helps to make sense of Israel’s strategic position vis-à-vis Syria.

Israel’s primary security interest lies in defending against worst-case scenarios, particularly the potential collapse of the Syrian state or its transformation into an actively hostile force backed by a significant Turkish presence (considering that the Turkish military is the second largest in NATO) with all that this would imply. Hence the need to bolster the new buffer zone—not for territorial gain, but as a vital shield and guarantee against dangerous developments. Continued airstrikes aimed at diminishing the residual components of strategic military capabilities inherited from the Assad regime are essential.

At the same time, there is a need to create conditions that would enable those in Damascus who wish to reject the reduction of their once-proud country into a Turkish satrapy. Sharaa’s efforts to establish his legitimacy, including his visit to Paris and outreach to the U.S., other European nations, and key Gulf countries, may generate positive leverage in this regard. Israel’s role is to demonstrate through daily actions the severe costs of acceding to Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ambitions and accepting Turkish hegemony.

Israel should also assist those in Syria (and beyond: this may have an effect in Lebanon as well) who look to it as a strategic anchor in the region. The Druze in Syria—backed by their brethren in Israel—have openly expressed this expectation, breaking decades of loyalty to the central power in Damascus over their obligation to their kith and kin.