On May 9, a popular Hebrew X account called “News From a Year Ago” tweeted a short video of Donald Trump, then running for US president, from May, 2024.
“If any Jewish person voted for Joe Biden, they should be ashamed of themselves,” Trump said in the video. “He’s totally abandoned Israel and nobody can believe it.”
One year later, if there’s a president many Israelis are viewing with disbelief, it’s Trump himself.
Trump — who campaigned on his record of good relations with Israel and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — has spent the past month building out a vision for US policy in the Middle East that appears to be sidelining the country and its leader.
His recent steps have sparked concern from Israelis across the political spectrum — as well as American Jews who, regardless of their opinion of Trump or Netanyahu, have supported a close US-Israel relationship.
Trump’s steps come at a time when Israel has been under increasing criticism from other nations that were once close allies.
“Trump is signaling to Netanyahu, ‘Honey, I’ve had enough of you,’” Israeli commentator Dana Fahn Luzon said on a TV debate this week over Trump’s recent deal with the Houthi terror group, which has been firing missiles at Israel for more than a year. “That he didn’t update us, that he couldn’t say it . . . He doesn’t take Netanyahu into account.”
In his first term, Trump granted the Israeli government’s wish-list — moving the US embassy to Jerusalem, withdrawing from the Iran nuclear agreement, brokering peace deals with four Arab states and recognized Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights. Ahead of the 2024 election, nearly two-thirds of Israelis said they preferred Trump over Vice President Kamala Harris.
The opening weeks of Trump’s second term also drew Israeli cheers: Trump brokered a deal to release Israeli hostages from Gaza without committing Israel to end the war — then said the US would take over the territory, which he hoped to empty of Palestinians.
But a shift emerged:
• In March, a US negotiator entered direct talks with Hamas. The talks ended after they did not achieve their intended goal, a hostage release, but they were unprecedented.
• On April 7, as Netanyahu traveled to the White House in what he said was a bid to remove US tariffs on Israeli imports, Trump announced they would remain.
• During the White House visit, Trump announced that the US would conduct direct negotiations with Iran, Israel’s chief adversary, and would not cooperate with an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.
Some reports from those negotiations indicate that they may result in something similar to the Obama-era Iran deal that Trump himself lambasted.
• Weeks later, Axios reported that on his first foreign trip this week, Trump hoped to hold a summit with Arab states — but not Israel.
• On May 6, Trump announced that the US and the Houthi terror group in Yemen had reached a truce — without requiring the Houthis to stop attacking Israel. Israeli officials were reportedly surprised by the deal. Netanyahu vowed to “defend ourselves alone.”
• On May 9, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth scrapped his planned trip to Israel, instead accompanying Trump on his Middle East sojourn.
Critics and supporters of Netanyahu and Trump alike are noticing. On May 8, the front page of Yediot Aharonot, an Israeli daily seen as critical of Netanyahu, blared that Trump had a “policy of surprises” when it came to Israel. Below it was a political cartoon showing Trump cooking up a soup for Netanyahu, who sits, with a shocked expression, at a restaurant table behind the president.
“The Americans are advancing a deal with the Saudis, advancing a deal with Iran, advancing a new regional outline . . . but the Americans don’t take Netanyahu or Israel into account,” tweeted Yair Golan, head of an Israeli left-wing party.
“President Trump, whom Netan-yahu saw as a strategic partner for his survival, understands today that Netanyahu isn’t an asset but a liability.”
Such opinions exposed the risks of punditry, as Trump spoke openly and strongly in Saudi Arabia about the Saudis recognizing Israel and joining the Abraham Accords, which Trump called a bonanza for the countries that joined.
In remarks following his meeting with the Saudis in Riyadh on May 13, Trump said:
“It’s been an amazing thing, the Abraham Accords. It’s my fervent hope, wish and even my dream, that Saudi Arabia, a place I have such respect for . . . We’ll soon be joining the Abraham Accords.”
He spoke with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman looking on.
“I think it will be a tremendous tribute to your country and something that’s going to be very important for the future of the Middle East. I took a risk in doing them. They’ve been an absolute bonanza for the countries that joined.”
Trump added that the kingdom “will do it in your own time.”
In advance of Trump’s remarks in Saudi Arabia, Netanyahu’s allies also expressed concerns. Nissim Vaturi, a lawmaker in Netanyahu’s Likud Party, tweeted that Trump “is an important friend of Israel. He should remember that he was elected to the presidency riding on the wings of support for Israel.” He later deleted the tweet.
Other voices are framing Trump’s actions as a bane for Israel. Avraham Ben-Tzvi, a scholar of US-Israel relations and columnist for the right-leaning daily Israel Hayom, pointed to a “bitterness” toward Israel in Washington, DC.
“The main expression of this bitterness is the sidelining of Israel, and an American effort to advance along routes that bypass Jerusalem,” he wrote May 7, asking “whether a new Middle East order is indeed forming before our eyes, without Israel as an official partner.”
In the US, Halie Soifer, head of the Jewish Democratic Council of America, wrote May 9: “Despite the false perception that Trump is an ally of Israel, it has become increasingly clear that Trump’s ‘America First’ foreign policy does not prioritize Israel.”
Michael Koplow, chief policy officer of the Israel Policy Forum, wrote that Trump may be telling Israel that if it wants to keep fighting in Gaza, it can. But in that case, Trump will distance himself from Israel and does not want to be involved in its plans.
“Trump will give Israel all of the support it wants, provided that it doesn’t cost too much and doesn’t require tradeoffs elsewhere,” wrote Koplow. “Trump is not going to Israel because he doesn’t see any upside to going there and does not want to be dragged into Netanyahu’s Gaza mess.”
Trump’s actions have sparked some pushback on Capitol Hill. Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham says he will only support a deal with Iran that dismantles its nuclear program, and has continued to call for normalization between Saudi Arabia and Israel.
A bipartisan group of lawmakers wrote Trump a letter “to express our serious concern over the agreement reached on May 6 with the Iranian-backed Houthi forces in Yemen, which halts US strikes against Houthi targets without addressing the threat to Israel.”
But even within Trump’s own party, support for Israel might be slipping. A recent poll by the Arab American Institute found that nearly half of Republican respondents say that Trump should place greater pressure on Israel to allow a Palestinian state.
Many of Trump’s plans have yet to be finalized. But the Israeli-American writer Sarah Tuttle-Singer posted to Facebook that whatever happens in the end, Trump has engaged in “a dizzying turn of whiplash diplomacy” to Israel’s detriment.
“Trump courts deals with our enemies,” she wrote.
“He negotiates with Iran, signs understandings with the Houthis, and redraws lines in the region with Israel conspicuously left out of the room.”
JNS contributed to this report.
