US Ambassador David Friedman blatantly lied to Congress when he said he would oppose Israel’s annexation of West Bank lands and support a Palestinian state. He should be impeached for those misrepresentations, as well as for helping to block the visit to Palestine of Congress members Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar.
Donald Trump suggested shooting migrants in the legs to slow them down while they attempt to cross the U.S. Southern border. Perhaps he was inspired by Israeli practices in Gaza.
Trump’s Education Department lands another blow against free speech.
Most of the world might hate Donald Trump, but in some places, based largely on his policies, there is hope and even admiration. Political scientist Monti Datta says the data shows Trump is more popular than Barack Obama among people in authoritarian nations, and the one place in the world where Trump’s policies seem to be enjoying the most public support is Israel.
The successful Yemeni rebel drone attack shows that the disastrous Trump-Israel-Saudi Arabia alliance could trigger a global economic crisis. The New York Times report was more concerned with the impact on the global oil price than with the human cost of the Saudi-led war against Yemen, which is a root cause of the attack.
Trump fired John Bolton as national security adviser today, signalling his independence of donor Sheldon Adelson. Trump at last has the upper hand in his relationship with Netanyahu and Sheldon Adelson because Netanyahu desperately needs Trump to deliver on OK’ing Israel’s annexation of Jewish settlements, a huge Zionist victory that Netanyahu promised voters today in a desperate bid for reelection. Trump will deliver, but at the price of Iran policy.
A 17-year old Palestinian from Lebanon who was set to begin classes at Harvard University was denied entry into the United States on August 23. Ismail B. Ajjawi says he was questioned about the political posts of his friends before he was deported.
Trump’s claim that Jews who vote Democratic are “disloyal” is ugly and dangerous, but he is only echoing Zionist indoctrination: that American Jews must give unconditional support to Israel. New York Times columnist Bari Weiss praises the idea that “Jews should be loyal to Israel,” while Trump aide Elliott Abrams says Jews, except in Israel, “must stand apart from the nation in which they live.”
Trump’s refrain that the Democrats are anti-Israel is a strategic effort to foster division among Democrats over Israel so that he can get Jewish donors and voters in 2020. That division exists. The party’s progressive base wants to strip US aid to Israel, but House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Israeli President Rivlin are leaping in to assure the Democratic establishment that Israel is above politics.
Donald Trump took to Twitter to quote someone who claimed he is considered in Israel to be a king and the second coming of God. Yossi Gurvitz says that when you combine this with Trump’s claim that American Jews who vote Democrat are disloyal, you get a pretty accurate picture of what many Jews in Israel actually believe.