Since the 1967 Six Day War, it’s been consistent bipartisan US foreign policy to force Israel to surrender the lands won in that war.
President Donald Trump was no different during his first term in office and he publicly blamed Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu (Likud) for thwarting his two-state “Deal of the Century” in 2020 (Jared Kushner also confirmed this version of events in his memoirs).
Now back in office, Trump appears to be playing multiple political and diplomatic games that fly over the heads of most Israelis.
Prime Minister Netanyahu most likely sees the danger but has chosen to publicly praise the US president and to flatter his ego.
If the prime minister intends to resist Trump’s plans, he’ll likely do so quietly. He knows that Donald Trump isn’t Joe Biden or Kamala Harris. There’s a difference in terms of how much open defiance he can expect to get away with.
The real problem is that Israel’s national camp can’t see the core contradictions between US interests in West Asia and Jewish national interests.
The sooner we learn to recognize these, the sooner we can work towards true independence.
