Days after claiming Jewish Democrats who criticize Israel “hate” the country and hate “their religion,” Donald Trump went on a confusing rant in which he both criticized Israeli military actions in Gaza as a “big mistake” and indicated he would have responded similarly to the Oct. 7 Hamas terror attacks.
In an interview with an Israeli newspaper published on Monday, Trump said he would have responded to Hamas’ terrorist attacks “very much the same way as [Israel] did.”
“Only a fool would not do that,” he said.
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But asked in a follow up how he would counter the wave of antisemitism unleashed after Oct. 7 as president, Trump suggested the rise in hatred was due to Israel’s response.
“Well, that's because you fought back,” Trump said. “And I think Israel made a very big mistake. I wanted to call [Israel] and say don't do it. These photos and shots. I mean, moving shots of bombs being dropped into buildings in Gaza. And I said, Oh, that's a terrible portrait. It's a very bad picture for the world.”
“The world is seeing this… every night, I would watch buildings pour down on people,” Trump continued.
In his harshest criticism of Israel since he lashed out at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the weeks after Oct. 7, Trump painted the Israeli bombardment more as bad optics than a humanitarian disaster, ignoring the tens of thousands of civilians reported dead and the widespread concerns of impending famine in Gaza.
“Go and do what you have to do,” Trump said of Israel’s government. “But you don't do that. And I think that's one of the reasons that there has been a lot of kickback. If people didn't see that, every single night I've watched every single one of those. And I think Israel wanted to show that it's tough, but sometimes you shouldn't be doing that.”
Beyond complaining at length about the country’s response to the Oct. 7 attacks in an interview with Israel Hayom, Trump also criticized President Joe Biden in even more blunt terms.
“He can't put two sentences together,” Trump said of Biden. “He can't talk. He's a very dumb person. He's a dumb person. His foreign policy throughout 50 years has been horrible. If you look at people that were in other administrations with him, they saw him as a weak, ineffective president, [Hamas] would have never done that attack if I were there."
In the days following the Hamas attacks, Trump said Netanyahu “let us down” when the U.S. assassinated Iranian military leader Qassem Soleimani and said the Israeli military needed to “step up its game.”
The former president did not mention the right-wing prime minister once in his interview with the newspaper whose favorable coverage of Netanyahu earned it the nickname "Bibiton.”
