Donald Trump slammed President Joe Biden for critiquing Israel even while it was being attacked with thousands of terror rockets from the Hamas terror group in Gaza.
“He actually criticized Israel while the Jewish homeland was under attack by thousands and thousands of rockets and missiles launched,” Trump said on Saturday in his first public address in nearly three months.
“There was a time everyone supported Israel. Today, I guess it’s just not in vogue,” he told the North Carolina Republican Convention.
Trump blamed Iran, which funds Palestinian terror groups in Gaza, for the 11-day conflict between Israel and Hamas. “It was launched by Iran,” he said.
The former president accused Congress, and in particular, its “radical” Democratic members, of “betraying Israel” over their condemnation of the Israeli military’s retaliatory strikes and their calls to cut defense aid to Jerusalem.
“It was a betrayal when you look at what happened in Congress,” he said. “Israel is really almost out, it’s almost out. It’s a very, very terrible thing.”
Amid heavy rocket fire, Trump last month lambasted Biden for his “weakness” and lack of support for Israel, which he said was leading to more violence and instability in the world.
“When I was in office we were known as the Peace Presidency, because Israel’s adversaries knew that the United States stood strongly with Israel and there would be swift retribution if Israel was attacked,” Trump said at the time.
“America must always stand with Israel and make clear that the Palestinians must end the violence, terror, and rocket attacks, and make clear that the U.S. will always strongly support Israel’s right to defend itself,” he added.
Hamas terror leaders Yahya Sinwar and Ismail Haniyeh have both claimed that the war “defeated” Trump administration-brokered normalization deals between Israel and Arab countries. The declarations fly in the face of ongoing agreements signed between those countries and Israel, even in the aftermath of the recent conflict.
More than 4,300 terror rockets were launched at Israel from the Hamas-ruling Gaza Strip from May 11. According to the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry, more than 230 Palestinians were killed in retaliatory strikes by the IDF against terror targets, 59 of them children.
Israel says more than 150 of those killed were terrorists from Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror groups.
Many, including children, were also killed by errant Hamas rockets. At least 450 rockets were misfired and landed within Gaza itself.
Thirteen people in Israel, including a five-year-old boy and a 16-year-old girl, were killed by rockets, and hundreds more were injured.