Drawing on the Talmud, the Bible, and the works of Moses Maimonides, a writer using the pseudonym Elijah del Medigo outlines an understanding of economics rooted in the Jewish tradition:

Property rights are enshrined in the Hebrew Bible, yet they are contingent, subject to the strictures of Jewish law. God, according to the Torah, is. . . the ultimate creator and owner of the earth and everything it contains. Therefore, God retains the ultimate rights over property. For instance, Jewish law requires that a small percentage of harvested produce, . . . known as t’rumah, be given to the priests. This percentage is not a mere tax; it is a precondition for consumption: produce from which t’rumah has not been offered is off-limits and its consumption is forbidden. . . .

As Maimonides makes clear, property rights in Judaism belong ultimately to God and are bestowed contingently, on condition that property is used in a manner which benefits society at large.

Poverty, in Judaism, is not considered the result of individual choices nor of poor habits. A midrash, [citing Leviticus 25:25], states: “There is a wheel which turns in the world; therefore Moses admonishes the people of Israel: ‘if your brother be waxen poor, . . . [then thou shalt relieve him].’” Poverty is a matter of fate, of cycles, whether cosmic or economic, which are out of the control of individuals or even of society as a whole. The halakhah does not put its trust in cure-all solutions, and its laws are designed to mitigate and to relieve suffering, not to abolish it entirely. “For paupers will never fully cease from the land,” the Torah says in Deuteronomy 15:11; the complete abolition of poverty is only possible through divine blessings, not via utopian schemes.

To Elliott Abrams, Donald Trump’s plan to remove the entire population of Gaza while the Strip is rebuilt is “unworkable,” at least “as a concrete proposal.” But it is welcome insofar as “its sheer iconoclasm might lead to a healthy rethinking of U.S. strategy and perhaps of Arab and Israeli policies as well.” The U.S., writes Abrams, must not only move beyond the failed approach to Gaza, but also must reject other assumptions that have failed time and again. One is the commitment to an illusory stability:

For two decades, what American policymakers have called “stability” has meant the preservation of the situation in which Gaza was entirely under Hamas control, Hizballah dominated Lebanon, and Iran’s nuclear program advanced. A better term for that situation would have been “erosion,” as U.S. influence steadily slipped away and Washington’s allies became less secure. Now, the United States has a chance to stop that process and aim instead for “reinforcement”: bolstering its interests and allies and actively weakening its adversaries. The result would be a region where threats diminish and U.S. alliances grow stronger.

Such an approach must be applied above all to the greatest threat in today’s Middle East, that of a nuclear Iran:

Trump clearly remains open to the possibility (however small) that an aging [Iranian supreme leader Ali] Khamenei, after witnessing the collapse of [his regional proxies], mulling the possibility of brutal economic sanctions, and being fully aware of the restiveness of his own population, would accept an agreement that stops the nuclear-weapons program and halts payments and arms shipments to Iran’s proxies. But Trump should be equally aware of the trap Khamenei might be setting for him: a phony new negotiation meant to ensnare Washington in talks for years, with Tehran’s negotiators leading Trump on with the mirage of a successful deal and a Nobel Peace Prize at the end of the road while the Iranian nuclear-weapons program grows in the shadows.