Trump said that Hamas would never have conducted their acts of war against Israel if he was the president in the White House. Trump frequently delivers that kind of opinion when foreign affairs call for a little reflection. In past rallies, he said that Putin would never have invaded Ukraine if he was in the White House, for example. I have no argument with those kinds of observations from Trump. He’s right. These kind of invasive actions were not taken during his presidency. Foreign leaders knew he would do as he said he would to retaliate against actions he warned against. And, frankly, many foreign leaders thought Trump was a little unstable and capable of being unpredictable. So, they steered away from getting sideways with him.

68% of Americans support Israel, according to the latest Fox News poll. Only 18% support Palestine. The rest had no opinion. One thing about being a political junkie and writer, it is hard for someone like me to imagine anyone not having an opinion. So, what would cause Trump, currently running for a second term as president, to take an opportunity at a campaign rally to criticize Israel Prime Minister Netanyahu at such a delicate time?

Trump launched into a story about how Netanyahu let him down when Israel decided not to participate in taking out Iranian General Qassem Soleimani. He said Netanyahu “let us down.”

“The night before it happened I get a call that Israel will not be participating in this attack,” Trump said of the drone strike during a rambling commentary. “I will never forget that Bibi Netanyahu let us down.”

He went on to describe Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite terrorist group as “very smart.” In what world does this kind of dialogue make sense from an American, much less a former president?

One of Trump’s Republican primary challengers spoke out about Trump’s comments. Ron DeSantis said that as president, he would “stand with Israel and treat terrorists like the scum that they are.”

“It is absurd that anyone, much less someone running for president, would choose now to attack our friend and ally, Israel, much less praise Hezbollah terrorists as ‘very smart’,” the Florida governor said.

Terrorists have murdered at least 1,200 Israelis and 22 Americans and are holding more hostage, so it is absurd that anyone, much less someone running for President, would choose now to attack our friend and ally, Israel, much less praise Hezbollah terrorists as “very smart.”

As… pic.twitter.com/408e82OVDP

— Ron DeSantis (@RonDeSantis) October 12, 2023

Some of the paid online surrogates for Trump are claiming that Trump was joking. No, it certainly didn’t sound like he was joking. He wasn’t. It’s not funny to trash an important ally as his country is at war with a terrorist organization, a proxy for Iran, that is trying to destroy the country and kill all its people. It is not funny to call Hezbollah, who is leading attacks on Israel from Lebanon, on Israel’s northern border. Netanyahu is at war with Hamas and Hezbollah and it is not the time for petty feelings left over from 2020 to be vented before a crowd of supporters. C’mon, man.

Where are the other candidates running in the Republican primary? Too scared to speak up against something Trump said? If that’s the case, they are not bold enough to be president. We have a nervous old man in the White House as it is. How’s that working out?

The White House is voicing three objectives right now – to support Israel, prevent the war from expanding, and bring American hostages home. That is the tone to take. Those are the important objectives. After a truly dreadful initial response from the Biden administration, including tweets calling for de-escalation which had to be deleted when the blowback came, the administration seems to be finding its footing. Biden delivered a kinda ok statement two days ago (four days late) in support of Israel but he didn’t say anything about Iran or its connection to funding Hamas. Yesterday he spoke to a group of Jewish religious leaders at the White House and did call out Iran, so that was progress. Today in Israel, Secretary of State Blinken made a good show of support for Israel in his remarks, joined by Netanyahu. The Biden administration is turning its tone-deaf and slow response to the war now being waged in Israel into a decent response. This is no time for the frontrunner for the Republican primary nomination to start sounding stupid toward America’s relationship with Israel.

The point is – so what if Netanyahu disappointed Trump in 2020? That has nothing to do with what is happening now. If true, Netanyahu must have had his reasons. He has been trying to protect Israel for decades.

“Hamas is ISIS,” Netanyahu said today. The ISIS flag has been found at the scene of atrocities carried out by Hamas in Israel. Trump helped decimate ISIS when he was president. He did the world a favor in greenlighting the drone attack that took out Soleimani. He can do better than criticizing Netanyahu during a political rally now.

A Trump spokesman tried to explain Trump’s choice of words about Hezbollah.

Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung rebuffed DeSantis’s critique and said the former president’s words were taken out of context.

“President Trump was clearly pointing out how incompetent Biden and his administration were by telegraphing to the terrorists an area that is susceptible to an attack. Smart does not equal good,” Cheung said.

That’s a lame statement. There is no misinterpreting what Trump said. He speaks plainly.

This is a time for moral clarity. There can be no in-between. No American should be saying anything that sounds complimentary about terrorists. No matter how you say it, if someone is being called smart, it is a compliment. Stop it.

As I was finishing up, I did find this from Chris Christie:

When one of our most important allies is at war and defending their women and children from terrorists, it’s a time to support them. All decent Americans understand this.

But not Donald Trump. What does he do? He praises the murderers and attacks Israel over petty personal… pic.twitter.com/NeXBGfTgUS

— Chris Christie (@GovChristie) October 12, 2023