Facing the American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee [AIPAC], 69-year-old real estate tycoon and GOP front-runner Donald Trump walks a razor’s edge clarifying his position on Israel and a two-state solution with Palestinians. Trump raised eyebrows Feb. 17 telling MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” with Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski that he’d be “neurtal” on the question of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. “If I win, I don’t want to be in a position where I’m saying to you [my choice] and the other side now says, ‘We don’t want Trump involved,’” Trump said. Trump’s words were taken way out-of-context by his GOP rivals Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fl.), ripping Trump for not backing Israel 100%. “Let me stay sort of a neutral guy,” said Trump, hoping, like past presidents, to give Palestinians some hope they’d be treated with some fairness and objectivity.
Trump walks a tightrope talking about “neutrality” on the Israeli-Palestinian question after eight years of failure by President Barack Obama to get a Mideast peace deal. Secretary of State John Kerry’s spent months ending in failure July 23, 2014, trying to get a two-state solution without any real Palestinian peace partner. When former President George W. Bush faced the same dilemma after Sept. 11, he set the Bush Doctrine that the U.S. would not deal with terrorists, no matter what their history or political agenda. Watching Palestinians dance in the streets of Gaza and Ramallah after Sept. 11 was a bitter pill for Bush to swallow. Bush’s State Department cut off Palestine Liberation Organization [PLO] founder Yasser Arafat for his long history with terrorism. Arafat died Nov. 11, 2004 in France of suspicious causes without realizing his dream of a Palestinian state.
Trump’s talked repeatedly of his ironclad support of Israel, only taking the “neutrality” position because it’s been a long U.S. position of trying to negotiate a fair and lasting Mideast peace. Since Sept. 11, Israel has become joined at the hip with the U.S. war against Islamic terrorism, making past negotiations obsolete. When former President Jimmy Carter negotiated the Camp David Accords in 1978, Israel surrendered the Sinai Peninsula in exchange for peace treaty with Egypt. Once turned over to the Egyptians, it didn’t take long for terrorists to turn the once popular seaside resort into a terrorists’ haven. Palestinians want all the land taken from the 1967 Six-Day-War returned by Israel. Encroachment by Islamic terrorism from the North, South and East, Israel can’t return its strategic buffer zones without compromising Israeli and U.S. national security.
Blowing Trump’s remarks on “Morning Joe” out of proportion, Cruz and Rubio accused the real estate tycoon of favoring Palestinians. When Trump goes before AIPAC March 21, he need only reassure the Jewish lobby that he won’t negotiate with terrorists, whether Palestinian of any other group. Obama’s Israeli-Palestinian policy failed precisely because he went back to a pre-Sept. 11 mindset, negotiating with Palestinian terrorists. When Hamas joined forces with the PLO in a unity pact April 23, 2014, Israel lost its peace partner. Committed to destroying Israel, Hamas made Kerry’s wasteful peace efforts all-but-impossible. Neither Obama nor Kerry could accept the fact that Israel can’t negotiate with any party committed to its destruction. Trump needs to remind AIPAC that the Obama-Kerry days of forcing Israel to make concessions with known terrorists is unacceptable.
Cruz hopes to go to AIPAC ripping Trump for his statements to Scarborough and Brzezinski about “neutrality.” To nip Cruz’s attacks in the bud, Trump need only remind AIPAC he won’t return to Obama’s policy of backing Palestinian terrorists. Faced with daily knife attacks, car rammings, snipings, etc., Trump need to state for the record that there can be no negotiations with Palestinians until they renounce violence to achieve political ends. Palestinians’ Gaza leader 53-year-old Ismail Haniyeh and 80-year-old PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas call violence toward Israelis “resistance,” pretending it’s not terrorism. If Trump tells AIPAC he won’t tolerate Palestinian terrorism of any kind, he’ll gain the lobby’s instant support. If Trump talks of more “neutrality,” he’ll alienate the group. Putting his foot down on Palestinian terrorism, Trump contrasts himself from Hillary.
Hillary, like Obama and Kerry, follows a of pre-Sept. 11 mindset, willing to negotiate with Palestinian terrorists to achieve a two-state solution. With Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the helm, it’s been difficult for Obama to make any headway. “It’s important that the lobby [AIPAC] keep itself on descent terms with whatever powers govern Washington,” analyst J.J. Goldberg wrote in the Jewish newspaper The Forward. Trump has a golden opportunity to separate himself from Obama, but, more importantly, Hillary, who’s continues a policy of pressuring Israel into making dangerous concessions to Palestinians. Returning to the Bush Doctrine of cutting off terrorist groups would pay rich dividends for Trump, showing a stark contrast with with Obama and Hillary. Hillary did nothing as Secretary of State other than pressure Israel to make more concessions to terrorists.
