Donald Trump criticised Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and called Hezbollah “very smart”. He made these statements less than a week after the attack on Israel, according to POLITICO.
In a speech to his supporters at the Palm Beach Convention Centre in Palm Beach, Florida, former President Donald Trump spoke for two hours about how, with his help, the US embassy in Israel was moved to Jerusalem. The former US president also boasted about signing the Abraham Accords, which formalised diplomatic relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.
In his speech, Trump went from topic to topic, starting with a story about terrorist attacks on Israel, then criticised his GOP rivals, talked about rising crime in Washington, his many accusations, even mentioning the attack on former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul.
Throughout his speech, Trump described a picture of an alternative world that he believes could exist if he took office in 2020 instead of President Joe Biden. He claimed:
Israel would be flourishing, they would have no problem. Iran would have never played that game.
Trump stated that instead the world is filled with “chaos, bloodshed, war, terror, death.” He also said the world is on the brink of World War III. He called Biden “blatantly incompetent” and characterised members of the Biden administration as “stupid people”.
He also directly addressed Netanyahu, who he said did not help the US in a 2020 drone strike that killed Suleimani, the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force in charge of covert military operations.
At the time of the killing, Netanyahu praised Trump for “quick, strong and decisive action,” but on Wednesday, Trump censured the Israeli prime minister. He claimed:
I’ll never forget that Bibi Netanyahu let us down. That was a very terrible thing.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, Trump’s rival in the election, had an immediate reaction to Trump’s statements. He wrote on his page on the website X:
It is absurd that anyone, much less someone running for President, would choose now to attack our friend and ally, Israel.
More than 1,200 Israelis and more than 1,100 militants and Palestinians have been killed since the attack on Israel on Saturday escalated into a war that threatens to destabilise the Middle East. According to the State Department, 22 Americans are among the dead, and 17 others have not been found.
Biden has said Washington supports Israel and the White House will ask Congress for assistance. However, Republicans running for president see the attack on Israel as a referendum on whether Biden can handle the international conflict as he seeks re-election for a second term.
