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Trump’s Shifting Positions On Israel

P

needs to display some sympathy
erhaps President Trump
for the Palestinians as well as
recognized that he may
“fairness,” seems to have tried to
have shifted the balance in
level the political playing field in
the Israeli-Palestinian conflict too
the Mideast conflict.
far in favor of Israel or maybe he
First, in the interview, he did
was just shooting from the hip —
not defend Netanyahu who is
given the president’s record, it is
potentially facing bribery and
difficult to judge his motivations
fraud charges, and the White
— but he aimed some criticism at Berl Falbaum
House added that the investiga-
Israel that surely will confuse and
tion of the prime minister will
confound his supporters.
have no impact on the adminis-
Trump, in a recent interview
tration’s development of a peace
with Israel Hayom, a conservative
plan.
paper, questioned whether Israel is inter-
Second, he told the paper that he was
ested in peace. This is the same paper in
worried about “the settlements,” stating:
which Sheldon Adelson, the casino mag-
“Settlements are something that very
nate who is one of Trump’s major donors,
much complicate and always have com-
is an investor.
plicated making peace.”
It has been only a little more than two
That is not necessarily a new view for
months since Trump declared Jerusalem
Trump. When Netanyahu visited the
the capital of Israel although, prudently,
White House only a month after Trump
he did not discuss its borders. This pro-
took office, the president blindsided
nouncement endeared him to segments
Netanyahu by asking him, publicly at a
of the Jewish community while critics,
press conference, to “hold off on settle-
including Jewish ones, chastised him
ments for a bit.”
for his favoritism, lack of objectivity and
Surprised, Netanyahu was liter-
making a peace deal more difficult to
ally speechless, and after recovering, he
achieve. The Trump administration has
responded, “We’ll see.”
since announced it plans to move the U.S.
Third, the president repeated his com-
embassy from Tel-Aviv to Jerusalem in
plaint that he is not confident that the
May, to coincide with Israel’s 70th anni-
Palestinians want to negotiate a peace.
versary.
But then he added, “I am not necessarily
This played out in a scenario that
sure that Israel is looking to make peace.”
described Trump and Israeli Prime
Finally, perhaps the most serious
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as bosom
implied criticism came after Netanyahu
buddies.
reportedly told associates he had dis-
But now, Trump, perhaps advised he

cussed with the U.S. a plan that would
permit Israel to annex territory in the
West Bank.
That prompted, if not an outright
rebuke from the White House, the follow-
ing statement: “The United States and
Israel have never discussed such a pro-
posal and the president’s focus remains
squarely on his Palestinian peace initia-
tive.”
That initiative is reportedly being
developed by Jared Kushner, the presi-
dent’s son-in-law, and Jason D. Greenblatt,
Trump’s special representative for inter-
national negotiations. In the interview,
Trump gave no indication when that plan
might be unveiled.
Despite his negative comments, Trump
described the relationship between the
U.S. and Israel as good. Specifically, he
said: “… I think Bibi is a terrific person, a
terrific leader. I think the relationships are
good, but I think they will be a lot better if
they ever get to making a peace deal.”
Trump also stunned all sides when, last
May, while on a five-country trip, which
included Israel, a U.S. consulate member
warned Israeli officials that Trump did
not want Netanyahu to join him at the
Western Wall. The consulate explained:
“What are you talking about? It’s none of
your business. It’s not even part of your
responsibility. It’s not your territory. It’s
part of the West Bank.”
While the White House tried to amelio-
rate the embarrassing outburst, the state-
ment did little to clarify where Trump

stands, and even U.S. ambassador to the
U.N. Nikki Haley, stated, “I don’t know
what the policy of the administration is …”
It is difficult to gauge how much to read
into the president’s comments given his
record on foreign policies. He came into
office stating that NATO was obsolete,
but after meeting with NATO Secretary
General Jens Stoltenberg, announced,
without any explanation, that it was “no
longer obsolete.”
While charging in his campaign that
China was a “currency manipulator,” he
reversed that position, stating that China
stopped its manipulation when he took
office.
He also has changed his positions on
several domestic issues.
As to Jerusalem, in the interview,
Trump said that he will accept whatever
the two sides decide. He said the same
thing about a two-state solution at his
first meeting with Netanyahu. That, of
course, is hardly a policy since every medi-
ator will acquiesce to decisions made by
competing factions. No mediator would
refuse to accept an agreement reached by
adversaries whether the clashes involve
labor/management or parties in interna-
tional politics.
Let us hope when Trump’s Palestinian/
Israeli peace plan is completed, it will pro-
vide more clarity. •

elevated above all else and that it creates
a moral equivalence; hurt my feelings
and I can hurt you. It is unlikely that it is
purely about guns and Republicans and
Democrats and Obama and Trump and
the lobby and the hypocrisy.
What is certain is that whilst we
continue to have the same conversa-
tions about all the same things, there
is a kid somewhere who feels that it is
acceptable and indeed justified to mur-
der other children. And is planning to
do just that whilst we debate whether
Obama or Trump is to blame.
My incidents resulted in no one’s
death. And yet it has taken years to
mend. To some extent, because the

events happened within a short period
of each other, the “complex” nature of
the trauma might never fully leave me.
It is hard to imagine how the survivors
in Florida will recover. And even harder
to imagine the families of those who did
not. But the one thing that is certain is
that if we don’t begin to have real con-
versations about why this is happening
instead of with what it is happening, we
can count on it happening again. •

Berl Falbaum of West Bloomfield is a veteran journal-
ist and author.

commentary

continued from page 5

And the place where I experienced two
gun-related incidents.
We are told that Israel doesn’t experi-
ence this. Nor Japan. And whereas parts
of Africa have been decimated by the
violence of Boko Haram and others, and
where children are often recruited to
fight adult wars, fellow students don’t
seem to walk into a school and kill each
other just because.
What is it about the environment
in the USA that causes children to
believe that killing other children (and
teachers) is a viable option? Forget the
guns for just a moment — they are the
means of death. They are the result. The
debate as to whether removing access

8

March 1 • 2018

jn

to guns would reduce the instance of
these events is important but far from
the essence of what I believe should be
the discussion. Rather, I believe that we
should be seeking to determine what
lies beneath the surface that allows chil-
dren to see killing others as an option.
We need to understand what causes
children to experience the degree of
loneliness and alienation and pain that
is so massive they plan and execute the
horror that has become so common.
The answer has to be complex. It is
unlikely that it is simply violent games,
or the lack of God in schools or bully-
ing or mental health. It is unlikely that it
is simply that emotional hurt has been

Howard Feldman is a lawyer, a physical commodity
trader by industry and a writer by obsession. This
essay was originally published in Times of Israel.