As is often the case, Trump’s odd way of speaking often creates more confusion about his ultimate positions than it clarifies.
Donald Trump undoubtedly had one of the most pro-Israel records of a U.S. president in history, and arguably the most pro-Israel. But it’s unclear how similar his policy would be in a second term given that personnel will be different, he’s lamented that Jews have been ungrateful by not voting for him, and he’s complained that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu joined other world leaders in congratulating Joe Biden after the 2020 election while Trump was still claiming it was stolen. So, as Biden turns increasingly hostile toward Israel, most recently betraying Israel at the United Nations, it’s worth considering what a second Trump term might look like. Unfortunately, in an interview with the Israeli publication Israel Hayom, Trump offered mixed signals.
At the outset, Trump was unequivocal when asked how he would have reacted had he faced the atrocities of October 7. “I would say I would act very much the same way as you did,” he said to the Israeli journalists. “You would have to be crazy not to. Only a fool would not do that. That was a horrible attack.”
But then when asked how he would respond to the rise in antisemitic attacks since October 7, he criticized the Israeli response:
Well, that’s because you fought back. And I think Israel made a very big mistake. I wanted to call [Israel] and say don’t do it. These photos and shots. I mean, moving shots of bombs being dropped into buildings in Gaza. And I said, Oh, that’s a terrible portrait. It’s a very bad picture for the world. The world is seeing this . . . every night, I would watch buildings pour down on people. It would say it was given by the Defense Ministry, and said whoever’s providing that that’s a bad image.
When it was noted that there were terrorists in the buildings, he said, “Go and do what you have to do. But you don’t do that. And I think that’s one of the reasons that there has been a lot of kickback. If people didn’t see that, every single night I’d watch and every single one of those . . . And I think Israel wanted to show that it’s tough, but sometimes you shouldn’t be doing that.”
Later in the interview, he says of visiting Israel, “I would love to. I was treated very well there. In Israel, they say if I ran for office in Israel I’d get 98 percent of the vote.” He also called AOC and other anti-Israel Democrats “lunatics” for hating Israel, and said, “I’m not Jewish. And yet Israel for me is very important.”
Another comment is being portrayed in some quarters as his calling for a cease-fire, but again, it could be interpreted in the opposite way. He said, “You have to finish up your war,” he said. “To finish it up. You gotta get it done. And, I am sure you will do that. And we gotta get to peace, we can’t have this going on. And I will say, Israel has to be very careful, because you’re losing a lot of the world, you’re losing a lot of support, you have to finish up, you have to get the job done. And you have to get on to peace, to get on to a normal life for Israel, and for everybody else.”
At another point in the interview, he said, “Israel has to get better with the promotional and with the public relations, because right now they’re really, they’re being hurt very badly.”
One way of looking at the interview as a whole is that Trump is saying Israel should do whatever it has to to finish the job, but it should wrap it up quickly, and avoid sharing videos on social media depicting hits on Hamas terrorist sites. But some of his comments also leave open the question as to how he would respond to images from the prolonged campaign in Gaza as president.
As is often the case, Trump’s odd way of speaking often creates more confusion about his ultimate positions than it clarifies.