Will Trump Ever Stop Outsourcing Domestic & Foreign Policy to War Criminals and Autocrats

 

Will Trump Ever Stop Outsourcing Domestic & Foreign Policy to War Criminals and Autocrats?

For a man who takes credit for solving major global conflicts, his participation usually denied by the relevant combatants, Trump has been an abysmal failure at the conflicts where he probably could have effected a peaceful resolution, including Gaza and the Russian war on Ukraine (that “day one” promised settlement”). Instead, his actions and inactions have essentially prolonged both conflicts, as thousands continue to die unnecessarily. In fact, Trump has the greatest leverage of anyone to generate the desired cease fires. That he never uses that leverage against strongmen attackers, doesn’t make good on his “serious consequences” threats for those who do not comply with his ceasefire demands, Trump seems to have as much of a likelihood of a Nobel Peace Prize as my cat.

Trump August 15th summit with Vladimir Putin at Joint Base Elmendorf–Richardson in Anchorage, Alaska, is a classic example. Claiming he extracted serious concessions from the Russian President such that his threatened sanctions were not necessary, the succeeding weeks revealed that Putin had not budged a single inch on anything. Zippo. Trump was the clown prince of peace. Next, Trump threatened Europe that unless they all stopped buying oil from Russia, he would not support Europe’s own peace efforts, knowing that Hungary’s PM Viktor Orbán, with a Trump-like bromance with Putin, was not about to stop buying Russian fossil fuel. And sure, Trump was willing to alienate one of our most significant allies, India, for buying Russian oil, by slapping 50% tariffs on that nation, while not even making the tariff level for China rise a whit… even though China is the number one buyer of Russian oil.

Trump’s love and respect (envy?) for brutal dictators – his proclivity to favor “strongmen” over “democratic leaders” – creates a predictable result… every time. Trump has flipflopped like a fish out of water in dealing with Putin; the Russian President has not waivered an inch. Trump has excoriated Ukraine’s Zelenskyy and our European allies with very little of that hostility directed at Russia. As 19 Russian drones crossed into Poland, a NATO ally, Trump poo-pooed the findings of his EU/NATO leaders determining that these drone incursions were clearly intentional – testing Europe’s resolve. Trump has misstated more than once that Ukraine started the conflict, pushing Zelenskyy to make major concessions while liberally deeming Putin’s outrageous demands as “reasonable.”

Trump could join his European allies, who live in the same global neighborhood as does Moscow, bolstering a collective resolve in support of Ukraine. Trump could approve the sale of more longer-range missiles in addition to upgrading defensive systems needed by Ukraine, releasing the use of range limitations, but other than an occasion expression of disappointment or unhappiness at the indicted war criminal, Putin, Trump waivers and believes pledges of future economic relations are enough to force a ceasefire and a most lasting, fair solution. But his wish-washy resolve has only incented Putin to mount the most aggressive attack on Ukraine to date.

Indeed, Trump’s admiration of brutal strongmen, particularly an indicted war criminal (along with Hamas leadership) has given Isreal a cart blanche to Isreal to starve, bomb, shell and shoot

Gaza’s Palestinians, deny any potential for their own state and mount a new horrific decimation of Gaza city, as its population attempts to flee with nowhere to go. There are very few people in the Western world, including the United States, who would hold Hamas anything but brutal, immoral terrorists who initiated a hostage-taking, savage and unprovoked, murderous attack on innocent Israeli citizens near the border with Gaza. That needless slaughter, including violent rape and killing of children has no justification on any basis whatsoever.

But even as ordinary Palestinian civilians living in Gaza deeply resent the Hamas bully-soldiers in their midst, since that attack on October 7, 2023, Israel’s bombing, shelling and shooting retaliation of a Gaza, cutting off food and medical supplies, and destroying schools, hospitals and food distribution centers, has killed over an estimated 65 thousand people, a very small portion of which were Hama fighters, with thousands and thousand of children killed as well. The Israeli Defense Force always pointed to Hamas using those facilities, holding civilian Palestinians as human shields and using indiscriminate shelling to render 90% of the buildings in Gaza seriously damaged or destroyed. With no foreign journalists permitted by Israel, how would we know? The remaining Israeli hostages are held as Hamas’ lingering leverage to force a ceasefire.

The recent Israeli strike on a quiet residential district in Qatar where Hamas negotiators lived seemed to quell any hope of a negotiated ceasefire and seriously undermined US relations with a number of its regional Arab allies. Israel then mounted its greatest strike on Gaza City, pledging to level it to make it unusable. Hundreds of thousands of fleeing Gazans clogged roads in a desperate attempt to escape, but they literally had no place to go. As Israel’s only major ally on Earth, the United States remains the main source of weapons other than those made in Israel. So, anytime Israel makes a decision involving weapons, the US shares the blame. That most of the major European allies are slowly recognizing Palestine as an independent state, has not weakened Natanyahu’s control over Trump’s policy of letting Israel have its way with Gaza, notwithstanding an occasional statement of “disappointment” emanating from Trump.

Meanwhile, an “independent United Nations inquiry has concluded for the first time that Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza and that the country’s top leaders have incited genocide, in what it described as the ‘most authoritative UN finding to date.... In a 72-page report released on Tuesday [9/16], the commission, which was set up by the UN Human Rights Council (HRC), found that Israel has ‘committed four genocidal acts’ in the enclave since October 7, 2023, when Hamas carried out deadly attacks on Israel and Israel launched its military campaign.” Associated Press, September 17th.

On September 18th: “The United States once again vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution… that had demanded an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza and the release of hostages after saying that the effort did not go far enough in condemning the militant group Hamas… All 14 other members of the United Nations’ most powerful body voted in favor of the resolution, which described the humanitarian situation in Gaza as ‘catastrophic’ and called on Israel to lift all restrictions on the aid delivery to the 2.1 million Palestinians in the territory.” LA Times, September 19th. This goes so far beyond Israel’s right to exist in peace and defend itself when attacked.

Even as most of my closest Jewish friends are increasingly passionately opposed to Israel’s extreme and unrelenting attack on innocent Palestinians, with children dying from starvation in droves every day, Donald Trump’s marching orders from Netanyahu and his powerful allies in the US, have pushed us into a further isolated global position as a rogue state. Trump adoration of strongmen, his open disdain for vulnerable and weak people, has resulted in the President of the United States literally outsourcing what we should be doing about the Russo-Ukraine War and our moral commitment to stop supply the weapons used to kill innocent Palestinians to strongmen Putin and Netanyahu, respectively.

And if anyone thinks this is good for either the American or Israeli people, the numbers, reported in the September 18th The Economist, might strongly suggest otherwise: “Our polling shows the mood is shifting sharply in America, not just among Democrats but also Republicans. A recent YouGov/Economist poll finds that 43% of Americans believe Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. In the past three years unfavourable views of Israel among Democrats over 50 rose by 23 percentage points. Among Republicans under 50, support is evenly divided, compared with 63% for Israel in 2022. If this loss of popular American support continues it will be catastrophic for a small country of 10m people in a hostile neighbourhood. Right now America is all that stands between Israel and pariah status. Optimists will call all of this scaremongering. We believe that view is dangerously complacent.” Trump does what he wants. But Gen Z is rising… and they will remember. But Trump really does not care: “The Trump administration has told Congress it plans to sell nearly $6 billion in weapons to Israel, a fresh surge of support for the U.S. ally as it faces increasing isolation over its war in Gaza.” LA Times, September 21st.

I’m Peter Dekom, and Trump’s proclivity to outsource key decisions to tyrants in obvious violation of our most basic moral code has done absolutely nothing to benefit us anywhere… and has pushed to many allies we need even farther away, with less respect for us than have ever had.