Donald Trump sees himself as 'protector' of Israel

The 2024 presidential election takes place amid war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. Donald Trump has long fashioned himself as Israel's champion. It is a stance likely to continue in a second term.

"You have a big protector in me. You don't have a protector on the other side," Trump said at the Israeli-American Council summit in October. And NPR said he repeated his longstanding assertion — called antisemitic by some — that Jewish-American voters owe him their vote for his Israel-friendly policies as president. "Anybody who's Jewish and loves being Jewish and loves Israel is a fool if they vote for a Democrat," he said.

In policy terms, that means a second Trump administration "would probably be more permissive toward the Israeli military campaign in Gaza," Uri Friedman said at The Atlantic. The Biden Administration has tried fitfully to impose some restraints on Israel's war. But Trump has signaled that he would like the conflict to end sooner than later. "I will give Israel the support that it needs to win," Trump said in August, "but I do want them to win fast."

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'Pro-Israel bona fides'

"Trump hasn't laid out a clear vision for Gaza," Nicole Narea said at Vox. But his first-term record is pretty clear: He recognized Israel's "controversial annexation" of the Golan Heights and — after years of pledges from American politicians — also recognized Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Those acts may have hurt America's ability to push Israeli-Palestinian negotiations forward. Trump sees those acts as "proof of his pro-Israel bona fides," Narea said.

Trump, a former real estate developer, sometimes seems to view Gaza as a development opportunity. Gaza could be like Monaco "if it was rebuilt the right way," he said on Hugh Hewitt's radio show. He admires Gaza's coastal setting. "You know, as a developer, it could be the most beautiful place — the weather, the water, the whole thing, the climate," Trump said, but added that Palestinians "never took advantage of it."

'Internal constraints' to ending war

Trump's vision of a Monaco-informed Gaza "has gained little traction," John T. Bennett said at Roll Call. It amounts to a plan to "ethnically cleanse millions of Palestinians from their land" and to do so "for the sake of beachfront property is either genocidal or delusional — or both," said Edward Ahmed Mitchell, national deputy director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Trump, Bennett said, "did not mention the Gazan population" in his musings.

Israeli officials, meanwhile, have "expressed concern" about Trump's call for a quick end to the war, said The Times of Israel. "There are internal political constraints to ending the war quickly," one anonymous official said. Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu has campaigned on "his ability to stand up" to Democratic presidents. It's not clear he would react to pressure from Trump to wrap things up. "A fight with Trump is something he hasn't really had to deal with," said the official, "and I think it's something he'd want to avoid."