Regarding Behnam's letter on the Friedman appointment-- I'm afraid Behnam is correct on this one, as we see in today's article on Trump's interference with Egypt's UN motion.
Not even in the White House yet, Trump   helped  Israel block an Egyptian motion which would have criticized Israeli settlements in the Occupied West Bank.  
In a sense this makes Trump less hypocritical than our current policy, which is to shake our finger at Israel, exclaim "You shouldn't have DONE  that" and let the settlements proceed.  The  result has been a massive influx of settlements creating the situation of "facts on the ground" which then justifies their existence.
As the policy of Trump and Friedman apparently aims to  allow Israel to take control of all the land "from the river to the sea" creating a single state, it means the "two-state solution." is dead.
That means for the million of Arabs in the region there is no longer hope for a peaceful, two-state solution. Hughe's scenario is all too likely