The Hamas Slaughter Confirmed Everything I Have Believed

Jews are hated because they are the Chosen People

by Dennis Prager for American Greatness

With one exception, nothing about Oct. 7 surprised me.

The one exception was Israel’s unpreparedness. That also surprised nearly every Israeli. My guess is that a combination of Iranian technology and Israeli complacency and incompetence led to the greatest slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust.

Nothing else surprised me. Not the butchery; not the sadism; not the Jew-hatred; not the theology that made the slaughter possible; not the support, even glee, in Gaza and among an untold number of Muslims around the world; not the reactions in our universities; and not the support of the Left (not of liberals).

The Middle East Dispute 

Since the 1970s, when I was a graduate student at the Middle East Institute of Columbia’s School of International Affairs, I knew what the Middle East conflict was about: Muslim rejection of a Jewish state in the middle of the Muslim world. To the best of my recollection, my professors – most of them fluent in Arabic and all experts on the Middle East – had it wrong. Being secular themselves and usually having a sympathetic view of the Arab world, they believed and taught that the issue was about land.

They were wrong. It was always about Muslim rejection of a Jewish state in their midst and a religious desire to destroy it.

In 2014, I presented a video for PragerU titled “The Middle East Problem.” It explains the Middle East problem in five minutes.

This is how It begins:

“When I did my graduate studies at the Middle East Institute at Columbia University… semester after semester, we studied the Middle East conflict as if it was the most complex conflict in the world when, in fact, it is probably the easiest conflict in the world to explain. It may be the hardest to solve, but it is the easiest to explain.

“In a nutshell, it’s this: One side wants the other side dead.”

Fifty years ago, I knew it. Muslims know it. Israel’s Jews know it. And now, unless you are a leftist, you know it.

I ended the video with another truism:

“Finally, think about these two questions: If, tomorrow, Israel laid down its arms and announced, ‘We will fight no more,’ what would happen? And if the Arab countries around Israel laid down their arms and announced, ‘We will fight no more,’ what would happen?

“In the first case, there would be an immediate destruction of the state of Israel and the mass murder of its Jewish population. In the second case, there would be peace the next day.”

As of Oct. 7, you know that too.

Why Jews Are Hated

There is no hatred like Jew-hatred. It is the longest ongoing hatred in history. It is the most universal. And it is the one exterminationist hatred: Those who hate the Jews want them destroyed. There is a Hebrew statement that is probably two thousand years old, and which is recited during the Passover Seder service: “In every generation, they arise to annihilate us.”

Note that the sentence does not say “to persecute us” or “to enslave us,” but “to annihilate us.”

The question is why?

I wrote an entire book – “Why the Jews?” – 40 years ago explaining antisemitism. But I can sum it up in a few sentences: Jew-hatred is largely a result of the Jews being The Chosen People. You can laugh at the idea if you are secular and inclined to do so. But those who hate the Jews have not laughed at the idea; they have hated the Jews because of it – because they believed it and/or because it is true.

The Jews introduced to humanity the God in which most of the world believes; brought into existence the Bible that is the basis of the New Testament and the Quran; gave the Christian world its Messiah; and gave much of the world its morality through the Torah, the Prophets, and the Ten Commandments. Those who hate that moral code hate the Jews. The two groups who have tried to exterminate the Jews in the last hundred years, the Nazis and the Islamists (not all Muslims), hate that moral code. And they hate the Jews for embodying it – compared to the Nazis and compared to Islamic regime of Iran, Hezbollah, ISIS and Hamas, Israel is composed of saints.

So, when I read about the horrors inflicted by Hamas on young Jews, old Jews and Jewish babies, I was horrified, but not at all surprised. That is what the most evil of any generation do to Jews. And that is why non-Jews who dismiss Iran, Hamas, or Hezbollah as the Jews’ problem are fools. Tens of millions of non-Jews were killed because most people dismissed Hitler and the Nazis as the Jews’ problem.

In fact, aside from increased loathing of Hamas and their Muslim and left-wing supporters, the only effect the events of Oct. 7 had on me was to reinforce my faith in the chosenness of the Jews.

X22, And we Know, and more- Oct 25

 

AP Refuses to Let its Reporters Describe Hamas as a Terrorist Organization

Eric Lendrum reporting for American Greatness 

The Associated Press has ordered its reporters and affiliated organizations to not refer to the terrorist organization Hamas as a terrorist organization, even after the group carried out a series of massive terror attacks against Israel.

According to the Washington Free Beacon, AP states in its “Israel-Hamas Topical Guide” that since “terrorism and terrorist have become politicized, and often are applied inconsistently…the AP is not using the terms for specific actions or groups, other than in direct quotations.”

As such, many regional newspapers and affiliated national publications such as Politico will follow the AP’s guidance in describing Hamas. This is despite the fact that Hamas has been categorized by many countries around the world as a terrorist group, including the United States and the European Union. Hamas has declared its intention to destroy Israel and wage war against Jews all over the world.

Instead, AP suggests that its reporters and affiliates describe Hamas terrorists as “militants.”

“Terms such as Hamas fighters, attackers or combatants are also acceptable depending on the context,” the AP continued.

The new guidance is not the first time that AP has sided with Hamas in its long-standing conflict with Israel. In May of 2021, a high-rise building in Gaza was destroyed by Israeli airstrikes after it was confirmed to be a major hub of Hamas activity. The building also featured office space that was utilized by the AP for roughly 15 years, though the AP and other non-terrorist occupants were given ample warning ahead of time to evacuate the building.

“We are shocked and horrified that the Israeli military would target and destroy the building housing AP’s bureau and other news organizations in Gaza,” the AP said in a statement at the time.

Further reports suggest that the AP employees in the building were well aware of Hamas’ presence. In 2014, The Atlantic reported that AP staffers in the building could see terrorists launching rockets into Israel from next door. They wouldn’t even report on Hamas’ activity despite facing numerous threats from the terrorists.

“Hamas fighters would burst into the AP’s Gaza bureau and threaten the staff—and the AP wouldn’t report it,” said The Atlantic’s report. “Cameramen waiting outside Shifa Hospital in Gaza City would film the arrival of civilian casualties and then, at a signal from an official, turn off their cameras when wounded and dead fighters came in, helping Hamas maintain the illusion that only civilians were dying.”

AP’s changing language towards Hamas is indicative of a broader pattern in which the major outlet seeks to warp public perception of major crises by using softer language. In March of 2021, the outlet ordered its journalists to not use the word “surge” to describe the tidal wave of third-world illegal aliens pouring over the southern border. In the summer of 2020, in the wake of George Floyd’s accidental death from a fentanyl overdose, the publication told its employees to not use words such as “riots” when describing the nationwide racial violence that followed, and to instead refer to such incidents as “unrest.”

Trump Attorneys Argue ‘Vindictive’ Special Counsel Indictment Criminalizes Speech

A ‘sitting President’s Administration is prosecuting his chief political opponent for supposedly making “false” claims challenging the validity of the sitting President’s election.’

Joy Pullman reporting for The Federalist

On Oct. 23, attorneys filed several motions to dismiss Special Counsel Jack Smith’s unprecedented case attempting to put former President Donald Trump in jail for up to 35 years. The three new motions filed at 9:14 p.m. Monday move to dismiss the case on both statutory and constitutional grounds and allege “selective and vindictive prosecution” before U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, a foreign-born Obama appointee who has publicly expressed personal animus against Trump and his supporters and refused to recuse herself from the case.

The filing appears to set up the case for appeal to the Supreme Court. Smith’s August indictment alleged Trump’s disputes with the reliability of the 2020 election amount to criminal conspiracies and obstructions.

Monday’s motion to dismiss based on constitutional grounds argues the entirety of Smith’s case against Trump is based on prosecuting the latter’s speech. Free speech is a constitutionally secured American right.

“Additionally, as the United States Senate has previously tried and acquitted President Trump for charges arising from the same course of conduct alleged in the indictment, the impeachment and double jeopardy clauses both bar retrial before this Court and require dismissal,” says the constitutional dismissal motion. “Finally, because of our country’s longstanding tradition of forceful political advocacy regarding perceived fraud and irregularities in numerous Presidential elections, President Trump lacked fair notice that his advocacy in this instance could be criminalized. Thus, the Court should dismiss the indictment under the Due Process clause as well.”

The motion quotes multiple Supreme Court cases, including multiple leftist justices, affirming that Americans have a constitutionally protected right to speak freely, even when their statements are false. Chutkan has stated she believes the speech Smith is attempting to criminalize with his indictment — publicly alleging problems with an election Democrats won — comprises “conspiracy theories.”

Another motion seeks to introduce some protections for Trump in a case that may involve a Washington, DC jury pool in a district where 92 percent voted for the president who demanded Trump’s current prosecution. It requests the judge strike “inflammatory allegations” from Smith’s indictment: “Because the Government has not charged President Trump with responsibility for the actions at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, allegations related to these actions are not relevant and are prejudicial and inflammatory.”

Voters Decide Political Questions or Courts?

A footnote in the constitutional motion cites The Federalist’s reporting on 2020 election interference, a February 2021 Time article depicting powerful leftists’ “shadow effort” to influence the election, and an Aug. 2023 CNN poll showing “Almost 40 percent of Americans, including almost 70 percent of Republicans, believe that the 2020 Presidential election was tainted by fraud or irregularity—a number that is increasing and has increased since 2020.”

The motion argues it’s unconstitutional to criminalize false beliefs and notes that Smith’s indictment would make America’s most powerful people the arbiter of truth. It concludes that the 2020 election fairness must be a matter of public debate, not criminalized in courts.

“[I]n every case, the indictment’s basis for the allegation that President Trump’s claims were ‘knowingly’ false is that a member of the political establishment assured President Trump that they were false,” it notes. “…Under the First Amendment, President Trump and his supporters are entitled to mistrust the word of such establishment-based government officials and draw their own inferences from the facts.”

The constitutional motion closes by noting the long American history of fiercely contesting elections, including the presidential elections of 1800, 1824, 1876, 1960, 2000, 2004, and 2016. Notably, in Trump’s first presidential contest, his challenger not only repeatedly alleged the election had been “stolen,” but her campaign devised a massive disinformation campaign around that narrative that led to federal spy and legal agencies surveilling, investigating, prosecuting, and overall hamstringing Trump during his entire presidency. The Democrat-run White House, predating Trump, assisted those efforts.

The current Democrat-run White House is involved in efforts to suppress information about these historical facts. A groundbreaking case about this is currently before the U.S. Supreme Court, which temporarily allowed Democrats to continue interfering with elections by controlling what information Americans hear and see.

“[A]ll the chief alleged acts charged in the indictment have a long historical pedigree in American electoral history, and they have long been decided in the political arena,” the constitutional motion dismiss states. “President Trump is the first person to face criminal charges for such core political behavior as disputing the outcome of an election. He is charged, moreover, under statutes that facially have nothing to do with his alleged conduct, and whose language the Special Prosecutor stretches beyond recognition.”

‘Selective and Vindictive Prosecution’

A third motion to dismiss filed Monday night concerns “selective and vindictive prosecution.” It notes Joe Biden pressured the Department of Justice he oversees to prosecute his opponent in both the previous and next elections. Before the DOJ appointed Smith special counsel to investigate Trump, the complaint notes, citing The Washington Post and New York Times, multiple senior DOJ officials had rejected subordinates’ pitches of legally pursuing Democrats’ top political opponent.

In April 2022, the Times reported, “Mr. Biden confided to his inner circle that he believed former President Donald J. Trump was a threat to democracy and should be prosecuted.” On Nov. 9, 2022, at a press conference, Biden publicly said of Trump: “We just have to demonstrate that he will not take power—if we—if he does run.”

Trump’s lawyers argue in this motion that “Biden’s publicly stated objective is to use the criminal justice system to incapacitate President Trump, his main political rival and the leading candidate in the upcoming election.”

Chutkan has already approved a gag order banning Trump — and anyone who communicates with him — from criticizing the DOJ, Chutkan, politicians who may become involved in any case related to Trump, or anything Chutkan personally finds inflammatory. If Chutkan decides Trump has violated this order, he could be subject to fines, home detention, or jail time.

“This case, urged by Biden when many prosecutors and agents appropriately saw no basis for it, is a straightforward retaliatory response to President Trump’s decisions as Commander In Chief in 2020, his exercising his constitutional rights to free speech and to petition for the redress of grievances, and his decision to run for political office,” the “vindictive” motion argues.

Trump’s lawyers argue that, based on these arguments, Chutkan should dismiss the indictment. Failing that, the lawyers argue for at least a hearing to suss out further evidence relating to prosecutors’ “vindictive” attempt to put Democrats’ No. 1 political opponent in jail for the rest of his life.

Selective Service: Should It Select Men and Women?

posted by Ward Clark at RedStateVIP 

My story from earlier today about the courageous women of the Caracal Battalion in the Israel Defense Forces brought another topic to mind: Should women be required to register for Selective Service — the draft? Representative Clarence “Burgess” Owens (R-UT) thinks so. In 2021, he introduced H.R. 5392 "To amend the Military Selective Service Act to allow women to elect to register for the draft." I agree with him — to a point. The first section of the bill reads as follows:

The Military Selective Service Act (50 U.S.C. 3801 et seq.) is amended as follows:

(1) Section 3 (50 U.S.C. 3802) is amended by adding at the end the following new subsection:

(c) A female citizen of the United States, or other female person residing in the United States, who is between the ages described in subsection (a), may elect to present herself and submit to registration pursuant to such subsection.

Here's the part I disagree with: If we are going to have a draft, then women shouldn't be allowed to "elect to present herself and submit to registration." What government does for (or, in this case, to) anyone, it must do for everyone, or it must do for no one. That includes the involuntary servitude we call Selective Service or the draft. If men have to register, so should women.

With that said, I’m not in favor of allowing women to serve in combat arms units. My wife, who had a military career spanning eight years and has a Bronze Star among her effects from that service, agrees. Women, as a rule, simply do not have the strength, endurance, and tolerance of trauma that men do. There are also hygiene issues involved in having women in the field for prolonged periods, and in combat, there is also the issue that men will do reckless things to protect women. Deny it all you like, but that’s a fact. I’d have damn little time for any man who wouldn’t take risks to protect a woman. As I said in the Caracal Battalion story:

It is important, however, to examine this as a broad policy and not to focus on the exceptions. My colleague streiff documented some of the difficultiesof women in strenuous combat-arms roles in a story that is now a few years old but no less accurate. As a quick summary, though, we can point out that men average 40 percent of body weight in muscle mass, compared to 30 percent for women. Men have significantly stronger bones, larger lung capacity, and larger hearts. Men can withstand more serious traumatic injuries than women while retaining more function. One shouldn't overlook one other inescapable cultural aspect of men in Western civilizations — that is, men will take more risks to protect women than they would other men.

But since we do have a Selective Service law, and since the services are now assigning women to traditionally all-male branches like Armor and Infantry, even though I disagree with those assignments, then fine. If you want that, you have to take all that comes with it, including a draft in the event of a major war. What government does for anyone, it must do for everyone, or it must do for no one. This doesn't require allowing women in combat units; many occupations require objective standards, including standards of strength and endurance and, in the case of the military, mission capability.

Personally, I would be in favor of doing away with Selective Service altogether. In our era of a high-tech, modern military that requires a fair amount of training to make soldiers proficient, two-year conscription isn’t really enough time to produce a troop that is technically and tactically proficient. Further, the big advantage of a volunteer Army is that we have people who are serving not by order but by choice. Early in my own career in Uncle Sam’s colors, there were plenty of NCOs and officers who remembered what it was like dealing with draftees, and to a man, they never wanted to go back to those days.

But equal treatment under the law means just that – equal treatment under the law. I’m still not in favor of putting women in combat arms roles. But that doesn’t mean, should circumstances call for it, that we couldn’t conscript them into other roles, freeing up men to serve in combat. If we’re going to have a Selective Service law at all, then yes, it should apply to both sexes.

Israel, of course, faces a different strategic situation than we do. Israel is a small country, surrounded by enemies, and faces extermination if they do not maintain all the military might they can muster. Women are required to serve a term in the Israel Defense Forces just as men do. The United States enjoys a much happier strategic situation, and there is no need for American women to serve in direct combat roles for which they are not ideally suited.

Draft — if we are going to have one — yes. Direct combat service in infantry and armor units — no.

Joe Scarborough Hates Authoritarian Behavior Except When It’s from Biden or Zelenskyy

Eddie Scarry reporting for The Federalist 

Believe it or not, Joe Scarborough still has an MSNBC show that’s influential in Washington and is still embarrassing himself on national television in ways that are truly awe-inspiring.

Scarborough on Tuesday delivered what he clearly believed would be a sure face melter. “It’s troubling to me he calls Orban one of the strongest leaders and says it in a wonderful way,” he said, referring to remarks President Trump made earlier in the week about Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban. “Of course, this is a person who shut down all of his opponents, politically. He’s tapped reporters’ phones. He’s destroyed independent news agencies. He’s led phony tax investigations into reporters that were critical of him, chased them from the country.”

Shut down all of his political opponents, you say?! Used the state to silence hostile media, you say?!

Despicable! Deplorable! Degenerate!

It’s interesting, though, that Scarborough is very much okay with virtually all of those things when they take place outside of Hungary.

The current U.S. president and his party are literally attempting to throw his most politically threatening rival in prison. In one of the 2 billion ridiculous criminal cases against Trump, a Democrat prosecutor is trying to void out his entire life’s work in real estate development. The Democrat-appointed judge overseeing the case has preemptively sided with her, suspending Trump’s business licenses before there has even been a trial.

Back in February, Biden went to Europe to continue his rhetorical fellating of Ukraine and President Zelensky, who Biden described as “a man whose courage would be forged in fire and steel.” He said it was an “honor” to be by Zelensky’s side as they “stand up for democracy” together.

For the uninitiated, Zelensky has indefinitely suspended elections in Ukraine, and before he found himself at war with Russia, he had shut down three TV stations for airing content sympathetic toward Russia. He has since “consolidated all TV platforms in Ukraine into one state broadcast and restricted political rivals” (NPR, July 8, 2022).

But after Biden’s speech of adoration, Scarborough could hardly contain himself as he fondly reflected on Zelensky’s bastion of democracy. “For those of us that believe that western democracy and that Jeffersonian democracy and that the freedoms that we believe in in this country and that we strive to — to live up to, even when we fall short,” he said, “this was the good stuff.”

What a dork. Scarborough is the living embodiment of that “Kombucha Girl” meme picturing a woman who tastes the drink and can’t determine whether she likes or detests it.

Authoritarian praised by Trump? “It’s troubling to me.”

Authoritarian praised by Biden? “The good stuff!”

Scarborough is still someone important in Washington. Fascinating.

Leftwing Cancel Culture Devours Its Own, and the Cries for Help Are Pathetic

Bonchie reporting for RedState 

Amidst a rash of antisemitism emanating from the left following the deadly terrorist attack by Hamas on October 7th, those who championed cancel culture are now being devoured by it. Somewhat surprisingly, corporations have decided that championing the largest slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust is a bridge too far. Most would consider that a justified standard. 

Yet, the same people who once lauded cancel culture as a necessary consequence are now demanding that conservatives come to their aid. Claims of hypocrisy are ringing out, claiming that because the right broadly opposed cancel culture, they should now go to bat for those who created it. 

Here are just two examples to make that point. 

So let me get this straight. The far-left has spent the last decade creating a system whereby political wrong-think is swiftly punished, including using advertiser boycotts as a chief weapon to take down conservative outlets, but the moment the alligator starts eating the one feeding it, I'm supposed to care? And not doing so makes me a "hypocrite?"

Where to even begin with that. We could start with the fact that a corporation not wanting promoters of genocide on their payroll is not even really cancel culture. No one who was previously against the de-platforming and firing of those with differing political opinions (i.e. most on the right) thought that standard included protections for the supporting of terrorists who butcher babies. Obviously, there are and always have been legitimate lines that can be crossed. That is one of them while wearing a MAGA hat is not. This isn't complicated.

Regardless, even if people being fired for their pro-Hamas views was a legitimate example of cancel culture, I still wouldn't care. I'll wear the title of hypocrite if I must because it's far more important that the far left be made to play by their own rules. The worst-case scenario for everyone would be to have a society that cancels people on the right for ten-year-old tweets they've apologized for but doesn't cancel people on the left for cheering on terrorists in the present day. 

In other words, I'm perfectly fine with people like this reaping what they sow. 

There are a lot of problems in the country that conservatives need to deal with. Saving leftists from their own pet monsters isn't one of them. Perhaps some lessons will be learned, but more likely, if the right were to actually help, it wouldn't be reciprocated in any fashion whatsoever. So what's the point? Why should any conservative go to bat for a left-winger getting canceled for their antisemitism? The answer is that they shouldn't, and the cries for help are pathetic. This is what the Democratic Party wanted, and they should get it.

Biden’s Global Chaos Vindicates the Strong Foreign Policy of His Top Rival

Unlike Trump, Biden is not shaping global events 

so much as he is reacting to them.

Cliff Sims reporting for The Federalist

The Middle East is on fire. Eastern Europe is gridlocked in war. America’s southern border looks like a scene out of “Mad Max.” And Southeast Asia is a tinderbox that could ignite with one wrong move. After four years of expanding peace under President Donald Trump, President Joe Biden is presiding over a world careening toward mayhem. “Mean tweets and world peace” has a nice ring to it. But it’s also worth exploring why Trump’s unorthodox approach to foreign affairs produced such markedly better results than Biden’s heralded return to normalcy.

The current state of the Middle East — where most recently on Biden’s watch, Iranian-backed Hamas terrorists attacked Israel, slaughtered civilians, and even took American citizens hostage — is a case study in the contrast between the two presidents.

Israel

In 2017, President Trump announced he was moving the U.S. embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. He made this decision against the advice of the professional diplomatic service at the State Department and in spite of opposition from his own secretaries of state and defense.

The day after the announcement was made, I was walking with him between meetings when a television hanging on the wall outside the Oval Office caught his attention. Images of Palestinians protesting his embassy decision were flashing across the screen, and members of the foreign policy establishment took turns decrying his decision as reckless and ill-advised. Biden, for his part, derisively called it “short-sighted and frivolous.”

Trump watched the segment casually but intently. When it concluded, he shrugged it off without a word, going about the rest of his day unaffected by the backlash. He had trusted his gut and made good on a pledge that Presidents Clinton, Bush, and Obama had all bailed on for one core reason: fear, the ultimate impediment to creativity and innovative thinking.

Biden’s criticism made it clear he would have mindlessly walked the same, well-worn path that bogged down so many presidents before him: prioritize the interests of the Palestinians, making a deal with them the only starting point to broader Middle East peace. After all, Biden doesn’t merely listen to the members of the foreign policy establishment who surround him; he is one of them, the living embodiment of conventional thinking.

Trump turned this paradigm on its head. He secured normalization agreements between Israel and Arab leaders acting in the interests of their own nations, increasing the likelihood the Palestinians would have to negotiate in good faith or risk getting left behind. The resulting Abraham Accords were a groundbreaking series of agreements that Biden had every opportunity to build upon after taking office.

But instead of proliferating peace, Biden’s actions may actually result in the proliferation of nuclear weapons in Iran and, at minimum, will necessitate the U.S. spending more time and money focusing on the Middle East, just when Americans thought we might finally move on.

Iran

In late 2019, Iran was engaged in an escalating series of attacks on U.S. forces. When Trump’s military advisers presented a menu of options to deal with Iran’s terrorist mastermind, Qasem Soleimani — who was actively plotting more attacks — he chose the most aggressive option: a Hellfire missile that tore him to pieces. 

Biden panicked, warning that the killing could bring the Middle East to “the brink of a major conflict.” 

Trump doubled down, telling the Iranians that if they responded by harming Americans, they would be “HIT VERY FAST AND VERY HARD.” Fortunately for them, they backed down.

After years of the Obama administration placating the Iranian regime — at one point even flying literal pallets of cash totaling $400 million to Tehran — Trump coupled crippling economic sanctions with a demonstration of raw, hard power, finally doing what it took to deter Iran from constantly terrorizing the region.

Once again, when Biden took office, he reverted to the failed ways of the past. His administration desperately chased a new, Obama-style nuclear deal. They unfroze Iranian assets. They gave a sanctions waiver to the Central Bank of Iran. They effectively made ransom payments for the return of American prisoners in Tehran. They allowed Iran to shrink its nuclear breakout time to under two weeks. And according to stunning reports, they even allowed the Iranian regime to establish an influence operation within Biden’s administration, elements of which remain to this day.

As it turns out, they were being duped every step of the way. Even as they enriched the Iranian regime and bent over backward to meet their demands, the Iranians were actively supporting the Hamas terrorists who invaded Israel and killed and captured American citizens.

Saudi Arabia

This week, as Israel retaliates against Hamas and the Biden administration scrambles to contain the spread of war, American diplomats are struggling to get U.S. partners and allies in the region to help. This brings us to a third study in contrast: Saudi Arabia.

In 2017, Trump empowered a small group of White House aides to lay the groundwork for Riyadh to be his first foreign stop as president. Again, even his own secretary of state decried the decision and staged an internal protest by refusing to participate in the planning. The results included bilateral economic, military, and counterterrorism agreements and a clear signal that America was serious about doing business with the Arab world — and about isolating Iran.

Again, Biden had an opportunity to build on this momentum, and again he reversed course. He proudly declared he would make Saudi Arabia an international “pariah” and suspended U.S. weapons sales to the country. Yet again, his actions produced negative consequences for the American people. When oil prices surged in early 2022, the Biden administration couldn’t even get the Saudis to return their calls, much less help ease the pain. The next thing Biden knew, the Saudis were running into the open arms of America’s top geopolitical rival, China, where they sought increased security and economic cooperation. By the time Biden realized how badly he had erred — showing up at the Riyadh airport while not being received by the kingdom’s rulers — it was too late, even as he tried to ease the tension with an infamous fist bump with the crown prince.

As it turns out, breathless moralizing and condescension are not a recipe for diplomatic success. Being self-righteous is not cost-free. And if you’re going to be sanctimonious, you’d at least better have a plan.

Stark Contrast

Does it not strike one as strange that the Biden administration lectures the leaders of nations with whom we share strategic interests while cozying up to America’s sworn enemies in Iran? One must admit, it is a strange perch from which to constantly claim the moral high ground.

As Biden would say, here’s the deal. In my experience working under Trump, I observed a president with a unique capacity to endure criticism without wavering, which makes outcomes that previously seemed out of reach — such as the expansion of Middle East peace — suddenly possible. He has the courage to do what’s necessary to deter America’s enemies, who can smell weakness like sharks smell blood in the water. And he’s willing to do business in tough neighborhoods when a deal could spread peace, increase stability, and serve America’s interests.

And these examples are from just one region of the world. Let’s also not forget that Russia invaded Georgia under President Bush, took Crimea under President Obama, and invaded Ukraine under President Biden. Yet when Donald Trump was president, Russia did not seize territory from any of its neighbors. The same principles apply. Ditto for the reasons China wasn’t seemingly on the precipice of seizing Taiwan for those same four years.

Unlike Trump, Biden is not shaping global events so much as he is reacting to them. So when their approaches are presented side-by-side, it becomes clear why Obama’s Secretary of Defense Bob Gates famously said Biden “has been wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades.”